Events / Ben Caudell / 11 August 2010 /

Xavier Malisse was a winning tip for Ben Caudell yesterday and there's plenty of reasons to think he can land the spoils again...

Andy Murray (GBR) v Xavier Malisse (BEL)
Andy Murray opens up his Rogers Cup campaign being played in Toronto this year with a tough second round match against yesterday's winning tip, Xavier Malisse.
The 23-year-old Scot is making his fifth appearance in the Canadian Master Series event that alternates between Toronto and Montreal, capturing the title last year with three straight wins over top 10 opponents. The fiery Brit has also managed to reach the semi-finals on two other occasions, in 2006 he lost to Richard Gasquet and in 2008 to Rafael Nadal, his worst performance came in 2007 when he lost a second round match against clay court specialist Fabio Fognini in straight sets.
Malisse's most notable performance at the Rogers Cup was in 2006 when the Belgian reached the quarter-finals before losing to Roger Federer in three sets.
Murray is without a coach at the moment after his recent spilt with Miles Maclagen and has chosen to take his time over appointing a new mentor deciding to wait until after the US Open when the tennis calendar slows down to make his mind up. The world No.4 played his first hard court tournament since his second round loss to Mardy Fish at the Miami Master Series event back in March as a wild card in the Los Angeles Open at the end of July. Having started the tournament off a little rusty after taking a short break after Wimbledon, Murray managed to reach the final before losing to the big serving Sam Querrey in a close three-set encounter.
The 23-year-old Brit has a 1-0 head-to-head series lead over Malisse (Wimbledon 2008, 6-4 6-2 6-2) and comes in with a 25-11 match record on the season (13-5 on hard) having reaching the quarter-finals or better five times this year. Murray has a 79-36 career match record at Master Series level and has won four of five finals the past two years.
Malisse is playing his 16th ATP World Tour level event of the year; his best results have been two semi-finals, at s-Hertogenbosch in June and last week in Washington. He began the season 5-10 but is 15-6 since June, reaching the quarter finals or better in four of the past six events.
Murray will not find it easy against Malisse today. The Belgian is experiencing a purple patch at the moment and is proving to be very tough to break on serve. Murray can often start tournaments a little sluggishly, and with this being his first match here I expect Malisse to take the early advantage. The 30-year-old Florida resident has a decent record against Top 10 opponents, winning two of three matches this year (Novak Djokovic, Tomas Berdych) and has a 6-3 mark v Top 10 since August 2006.
For my money, Murray is far too short to be backing pre-match at [1.21]. My tip today is to back Malisse +5.5 Games and Over 20.5 Games in the match.

Recommended Bets:
Back Malisse +5.5 Games @ [1.9]
Back Over 20.5 Games @ [1.85]

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