tennis | Monday, October 10, 2022 8:57 AM (Revised at: Monday, October 10, 2022 8:58 AM)

Monday Tennis Best Bet: WTA Cluj-Napoca, Ana Bogdan vs Jule Niemeier

Jon Reid

Ana Bogdan vs Jule Niemeier Best Bet: Monday, October 10th

Tough end to the week, as Alize Cornet played a much closer match than anticipated against clay courter Tamara Zidansek.

This week, we’ve got one European 250 in Romania and a big event in San Diego that has some of the bigger names in the women’s game taking part.

For Monday’s selection, it’s the former event in Cluj-Napoca that will be the centre of our attention, and the match between home favourite Ana Bogdan and Jule Niemeier.

In this article:

Ana Bogdan vs Jule Niemeier Preview
Ana Bogdan vs Jule Niemeier Best Bet

Ana Bogdan vs Jule Niemeier Preview

October 10th, 14;30 UK Time

The penultimate match of the opening day of main draw action in Romania will see the in-form Bogdan take on the big-hitting and big-serving Niemeier.

I was somewhat surprised to see Bogdan listed as the clear favourite in this matchup for a few reasons.

For starters, Niemeier has the bigger game of the two. While Bogdan can dial up the pace and looks to play some aggressive tennis on hard courts, she doesn’t possess the raw, natural power that her counterpart in this one does, nor does she have a first serve to win nearly as many cheap and/or free points.

Secondly, while the Romanian may be in form at the moment, she really hasn’t beaten that many players of note since she started to rack up the victories in late July. With lower-level 250s and high-level ITF comprising a lot of the success, many players she managed to take down were ITF-calibre opponents who she could push around with pace and aggression. That won’t be the case in this one.

It’s also worth noting that almost all that success came on clay courts in Iasi, Warsaw and Parma. On hard courts, she was dismissed as a massive favourite by the weaponless Fernanda Contreras Gomez in the second round of U.S. Open qualifying and then beat a clay courter in Tamara Zidansek, a poor Ajla Tomljanovic and a recently-lethargic Beatriz Haddad Maia in Portoroz, before being absolutely throttled by Elena Rybakina (who’s game style is much closer to Niemeier’s than the players Bogdan has beaten of late).

On the flip side, we’ve seen Niemeier thrive in quicker conditions, reaching the quarterfinals at Wimbledon and then beating Sofia Kenin, Yulia Putintseva and Qinwen Zheng at the U.S Open – all as an underdog – before losing to eventual champion Iga Swiatek (though she led that match by a set and break).

All in all, I find it tough to justify Bogdan being the favourite here, let alone a relatively decisive one.

Ana Bogdan vs Jule Niemeier Best Bet

This is a clear spot to back the underdog where the favourite is being overvalued in a sizable way over some strong form.

Considering the strength of the opposition for the vast majority of Bogdan’s wins don’t come close to the talent level that Niemeier possesses, while the big-hitting Niemeier has so often been undervalued herself, we’re seeing an overreaction and major value on the German.