US Open Men's Final Tips: Medvedev can ruin Djokovic's calendar Slam chances

Raducanu makes history with women's singles title

We now know the winner of the women's title with Emma Raducanu continuing her run of straight-set victories to lift the title in what was an extremely high-quality match against Leylah Fernandez.

Raducanu's victory gave a British player their first US Open title since 1968 and improved her world ranking from 150 to 23, when the updated rankings are released tomorrow. It also improved our tournament P&L to over the five point mark, in what has been a pretty successful event for this column.

Medvedev with relatively stress-free progress to the final

The one remaining singles match to be played, of course, is the men's final which features the two pre-tournament favourites - a rather different dynamic to the women's final which I'd be amazed if anyone had called in advance. Novak Djokovic, the world number one, edged Alexander Zverev in five sets on Friday while Daniil Medvedev eased past Felix Auger-Aliassime in straight sets, with the Russian still having dropped just one set en route to this stage.

Djokovic hasn't had it easy to get to the final, losing six sets in six matches, including four opening sets. Two of the six sets were lost against either a qualifier or a wild card. Medvedev, in my view, has impressed more in their six matches so far in New York.

Djokovic too short for calendar Slam

Despite this, Djokovic is 1.402/5 to win the title and I think that's short. It's a pretty similar line to his semi-final against Zverev and I think Medvedev is an upgrade on the German - and also there's a notable difference in terms of accumulated fatigue on the world number one following that five-set win over Zverev. Djokovic was only a marginal favourite for the Australian Open final in February against Medvedev. Is the market giving too much weight to Djokovic's attempt at the calendar-year Slam?

Game handicap looking like a viable option

On hard court this year, numbers suggest there's not much between the duo. Actually Medvedev has marginally better combined service/return points won percentages, and a higher sets won percentage as well.

Can Medvedev cause a shock here and beat the world number one and tournament favourite tonight? Absolutely.

The safer option for those who think Medvedev can compete well tonight is the game handicap. The Sportsbook is offering a market-leading 4/6 on Medvedev +5.5 games on the 'Alternative Game Handicap 1' market, and I like this line in what I think will be a very competitive men's singles final clash.

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