tennis | Thursday, June 29, 2023 9:03 AM (Revised at: Thursday, June 29, 2023 10:22 AM)

Thursday Tennis Best Bet: WTA Bad Homburg, Iga Swiatek vs Anna Blinkova

Jon Reid

Iga Swiatek vs Anna Blinkova Best Bet: Thursday, June 29th

Another day, another loss from the women’s bets. Just lovely. At this point, I highly encourage everyone to head over to my Twitter account for all posted bets, since this smaller sample size is in an incredibly frustrating rut. Blown leads, no comebacks, can’t buy a break. Priscilla Hon started off really poorly, before finding her footing in the match. She did come back in the second set and had three set points. Naturally, all were squandered and she lost in straight sets.

For Thursday, we’ll look at the match between Iga Swiatek and Anna Blinkova from Bad Homburg, Germany.

In this article:

Iga Swiatek vs Anna Blinkova Preview
Iga Swiatek vs Anna Blinkova Best Bet

Iga Swiatek vs Anna Blinkova Preview

June 29th, 15:30 (UK Time)

The world No. 1 needed a few matches on the grass to prepare for Wimbledon and she has done just that. She also chose to play a 250 in Germany, rather than the 500-level event in England to ensure she was able to get several matches in.

With a weaker field, she was much less likely to run into a tough first-round match that would send her packing instantly and get her to the year’s third grand slam event with just one match under her belt on the surface.

That conscious decision has paid dividends, as the Pole has absolutely dominated since losing her first set of the grass season to Tatjana Maria. In her last four sets against Maria and Jil Teichmann, she’s lost a combined six games. That’s the perfect way to get acclimated to the grass and build up her confidence.

Now taking on Blinkova, she’s positioned well to keep this run going. She shouldn’t be too concerned about making a deep run so close to Wimbledon – the tournament wraps up Saturday and she’ll have only played a handful of matches since the French Open even if she takes down the trophy.

Her Russian opponent doesn’t possess the typical game to trouble her. It almost always takes a big serve and big weapons from the baseline to trouble Swiatek. It’s easier to do on a quicker surface, but Blinkova simply doesn’t possess either the serve or the weapons from the baseline.

She’s not a grass specialist either and has been relatively average through her four matches so far on the green stuff.

Wins over an ice-cold Leylah Fernandez, a clay-court player in Laura Siegemund or a Sabine Lisicki who hasn’t been at her best in about five years don’t exactly move the needle.

Further, she lost to another clay courter in Elina Avanesyan, and that loss came from a dominant 6-1, 2-0 lead.

Iga Swiatek vs Anna Blinkova Best Bet

With Blinkova lacking the game needed to trouble Swiatek, I’m not sure why the total here is 19 games. That number implies a relatively normal tennis scoreline – something I’d only expect to see someone with weapons be able to force Swiatek to win by.

Regardless of the surface, we’ve seen time and again that the world’s top-ranked player absolutely dominates players that she can control the baseline against.

She’s proven that once again this week, winning four lopsided sets on the trot after a poor start to the tournament (though even that first set saw her break immediately and have a point for an early double break, before the big serves caught her off guard).

I have this as a cheap 17.5-game total or expensive 18. With this number coming in a full game higher, I think the smart play here is to bet it aggressively.