Big names exit - Osaka and Krejcikova
In the match of the day yesterday, Amanda Anisimova ousted Naomi Osaka in straight sets to leave Osaka still trying to recover her lost ranking as the season progresses, which could prove to be a problem in the remaining two Grand Slams of 2022.
In addition to this, the rusty Barbora Krejcikova was defeated by home player Diane Parry. The defending champion will not be able to retain her title. However, Iga Swiatek breezed into round two, adding yet another bagel to her impressive collection this season, with her win over Lesia Tsurenko, and the world number one clearly remains the player to beat at Roland Garros over the next couple of weeks.
Overwhelming favourites - plenty to choose from
Remaining first round matches take place today from the top half of the draw, featuring the likes of Simona Halep, Paula Badosa, Aryna Sabalenka and Daria Kasatkina all overwhelming favourites to progress. Throwing in Danielle Collins, Karolina Pliskova and Ekaterina Alexandrova as short-priced favourites too, there's not an abundance of competitive matches on today's card.
Competitive matches - Sherif vs Kostyuk
What I'm going to try and do today is run through some of the matches which the market thinks will be more evenly matched, and we'll start with Marta Kostyuk against Mayar Sherif. Kostyuk has huge potential but hasn't convinced on clay on the main tour, although did have very impressive return numbers on the surface at ITF level (albeit with mediocre service data). Opponent Sherif has just broken into the top 50, winning the Karlsruhe Challenger event earlier this month and also doing the same in April in Marbella - Sherif looks too good for ITFs, but whether she can translate that to the main tour is another debate, which is why she's a marginal underdog at 2.0621/20 for this.
Injury doubts - Volynets and Giorgi
Another player who is yet to translate her performances at ITF level is Katie Volynets, who has a good record in ITFs but retired last time out in Bonita Springs, which possibly influences her line against Viktorija Golubic. Golubic hasn't been too bad on clay in recent years, but has struggled this year albeit twice against Victoria Azarenka, so both players come into the match with doubts over the level which they will be at.
Both Shelby Rogers and Tereza Martincová have also picked up poor results on clay in the last year or so, although Rogers has been fairly competitive and has a strong long-term clay pedigree. Martincova's form this year on clay has been poor also, but there's not much to dispute that the market is wrong with Rogers at 1.8910/11.
On a problematic card, the final match worth discussing is Camila Giorgi against Shuai Zhang with Giorgi having the greater clay pedigree but coming into the match with a leg injury.
Zhang's results on clay have been miserable this year and doesn't have longer-term data to support any claims that she will be able to turn that around to any great extent, so the match appears to focus around Giorgi's injury, which is why she's 1.774/5 to get the win, and not shorter.
These discussions demonstrate why it is so tricky to be confident with round one picks in Grand Slams, but things should be easier in round two and moving forward when every player has at least one victory under their belt.
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