Madrid Masters Day 5 Tips: Munar looking like value after market over-reaction

Dan Weston
30 April 2023
3:00 min read

The market is against Jaume Munar on Sunday...

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There were more shocks on day four of the Madrid Masters on Saturday, and returning to give his thoughts on those, plus Sunday's action, is Dan Weston...

Auger-Aliassime and Shapovalov dumped out on day four
Alcaraz, Rublev and Zverv all heavy odds-on
Munar can get revenge for Barcelona loss to Arnaldi

Big names continue to struggle in Madrid

The big-name casualties on Saturday were Denis Shapovalov, who succumbed in a final set tiebreak against Zhizhen Zhang, while the same deciding set scoreline occurred as Felix Auger-Aliassime was edged by Dusan Lajovic.

This continues the Serb's impressive run of results of late, having defeated both Novak Djokovic plus Andrey Rublev to win the title in Banja Luka several weeks ago.

As for our game handicap pick, Dominic Thiem, against Stefanos Tsitsipas, it's in the balance at 3-3 in the final set. Thiem needs one more game to cover the +4.5 game line after winning the first 6-3 and losing the second 1-6.

Alcaraz a strong favourite for Dimitrov clash

Action on Sunday starts at 10am UK time, and contains the eight matches in the top half of the draw. This means that 1.9310/11 tournament favourite Carlos Alcaraz returns to the court with a clash against Grigor Dimitrov, and the Spaniard is just 1.121/8 to get past the Bulgarian, whose numbers on clay across the last year or so are far from a disaster.

After dropping the opening set against Emil Ruusuvuori here in round two, Alcaraz is likely going to need to play better to justify his market price.

Similarly priced is Andrey Rublev for his match against Yoshihito Nishioka. The Japanese man surprisingly got past Alex Molcan on Thursday, but faces a far tougher opponent here. Anything other than a routine Rublev win would be a surprise.

In what is rather a recurring theme here, there's another player who is heavy odds-on to win his match - Alexander Zverev.

I've given a fair bit of commentary of my views on Zverev since his injury comeback, and I think he's still far away from his top-five best level. He should, however, be expected to end qualifier Hugo Grenier's run to the third round, which has so far contained four consecutive underdog victories.

Munar a far bigger price than previous recent meeting with Arnaldi

However, we will be delving into a match with lower profile players featuring for today's value pick, with Matteo Arnaldi facing Jaume Munar.

The home player, Munar, actually has a winning record on clay on the ATP Tour over the last year, and has far better data than Arnaldi in clay Challengers.

Despite this, Arnaldi defeated Munar when they previously met, in Barcelona several weeks ago, when Munar started at around 1.454/9.

Indeed, Munar was sub 1.330/100 for their only other career meeting, at the Perugia Challenger in June 2022, so the 2.021/1 about the Spaniard stands out to me as something of an over-reaction to his loss to Arnaldi recently, plus Arnaldi's shock win over Casper Ruud here in round two.

Back Jaume Munar to beat Arnaldi @

2.02

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