tennis | Wednesday, November 9, 2022 9:28 AM (Revised at: Wednesday, November 9, 2022 9:29 AM)

Wednesday Tennis Best Bet: ATP Challenger Roanne, Gijs Brouwer vs Ugo Blanchet

Jon Reid

Gijs Brouwer vs Ugo Blanchet Best Bet: Wednesday, November 9th

Just a day after finally getting some positive variance to go our way, we lost with Adrian Andreev after he served for the match twice, leading 30-0 in both times and had a combined three match points. Not to be deterred, we ended up profiting on the match, thanks to the match going well over the total.

Onto Wednesday, where we’ll take a look at the match between Gijs Brouwer and Ugo Blanchet from the Challenger event in Roanne.

In this article:

Gijs Brouwer vs Ugo Blanchet Preview
Gijs Brouwer vs Ugo Blanchet Best Bet

Gijs Brouwer vs Ugo Blanchet Preview

November 9th, 10:00 UK Time

In one of the early matches from central France, as the opening round concludes, we’ll see the 26-year-old Brouwer look to take care of business against a player he’d expect to win against on an indoor hard court – even if he’s returning for his first match since retiring early in the second set last time out against Quentin Halys in Orleans late last month.

The Dutchman’s game should suit the conditions very well in Roanne, as the slight elevation and quicker courts will make his big first serve even more potent, the event being indoors neutralises any potential conditions hurting his game and his effective, low-bouncing slice on his backhand wing should allow him to keep Blanchet from really dictating points and pinning him to his backhand.

As for the 23-year-old Frenchman, his underpowered game could be in trouble against a powerful and much more established Brouwer. His hold rate on hard courts this season leaves plenty to be desired and he hasn’t managed to break his opponents often enough to make up for the rough patches he’s had thanks to his underpowered game.

Results haven’t been kind to him above the ITF level either, as he’s only played a handful of Challenger matches on hard courts of late, with losses to the likes of Clement Tabur (himself an underpowered clay courter that is usually found on the ITF circuit), Mats Rosenkranz (a more one-dimensional server) and Jurgen Briand (who had one strong run a few weeks back but isn’t exactly a Challenger Tour stalwart).

For me, Brouwer has more experience, is far better suited to the conditions in Roanne and his results have been far more impressive at the Challenger level.

Gijs Brouwer vs Ugo Blanchet Best Bet

With all that said, to break even on betting Brouwer to win, you would need him to take this match about 68% of the time. That may be a bit low but isn’t actually that far off for my money.

The mistake in this market comes in the handicap market, where -3 games can be had for 1.85. Considering the level of these players, the surface and conditions, as well as Blanchet’s poor service statistics, when Brouwer does win this match, he does so by at least three games the vast majority of the time.

I have this handicap at -3.5 around the 1.85 odds mark for this one, and that is a pretty important half-game in men’s tennis – especially on a quick indoor court.

I’d be willing to go with a decent-sized staking here, but with the recent injury for Brouwer, I’ll stick to a moderate-sized bet.