Kyle Edmund vs Fernando Verdasco Wimbledon Betting Tips - 7/3/2019
Kyle Edmund vs Fernando Verdasco
5:30 am EST, 3rd July 2019
Wimbledon, England
Grass courts
Kyle Edmund arrived at Wimbledon in a very solid form, after playing semifinals in Eastbourne last week. Conditions there were on the slower side when we compare it to some other grass courts and he really liked that. It gives him more time to set his feet and take a big swing at the ball, generating power on his groundstrokes, which are his most dangerous weapon. I thought that he might struggle a bit more in Wimbledon, because of slightly faster conditions, especially looking at his grass court record which was by far the worst among all three surfaces (10-18). But luckily for him, it seems like the playing conditions in Wimbledon are also slower than in some previous years. It allowed him to play his game and get a comfortable win in straight sets to open his Wimbledon campaign. He was returning Munar's serve really well, winning 43% of all the points in that situation, getting himself 15 break opportunities and converting 5 of those.
He will face another Spaniard in the second round, but this time around the opponent is not that inexperienced on this surface. Fernando Verdasco has almost 100 matches on this surface and almost 5x more wins than Edmund. He is still getting underestimated on this surface quite often. Including his previous match, where he played Kamil Majchrzak in the first round. The player from Poland was in decent form coming through the qualifying rounds, but he hasn't done anything worth mentioning at this level so far in his career and was favored over Verdasco despite that. Nando proved that pricing for the match was incorrect by winning in straights sets and spending less than two hours on the court. He was very solid behind his serve, scoring 12 aces and winning 75% of all the points in his service games. He was dominant in the baseline rallies as well with a nice winners to unforced errors ratio: 37-16. He was in the mediocre form before Wimbledon, losing in first rounds of both Hertogenbosch and Queens Club, but bounced back nicely with QF in Eastbourne. He had a quarterfinal run here in 2013 but didn't fare that well in recent years, failing to get out of the first round since 2015.
Matchup
Apart from playing with opposite hands, I'd say that their playing style is very similar. They both like some extra time on their forehand, so they can take a big swing at it. They both add a lot of topspin on their forehands and in general like to dictate the rally with some solid ball striking from behind the baseline. When you have two similar players like this, it usually comes down to who's in better form currently. Who can get better serving percentages and stay calm during pressure points. Big advantage that Verdasco has here is that he is a lefty and can stay away from Edmund's forehand that's been working so well for him lately. They played against each other 2 times so far. At the end of the last year in Vienna (indoor hard) and a couple of weeks ago in Rome on clay. Both times, Verdasco ended up on top.
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Betting odds & prediction
The line opened with Edmund being the -160 favorite and it didn't move much since then. I'm not surprised that they see the British player as the favorite here, considering the way he played recently and the usual disrespect for Verdasco on the grass. But, Fernando does have a lot of things going for him in this spot. Edmund is under a lot of pressure playing in front of the home crowd and being viewed as a favorite against a very dangerous player. And he didn't do that well under pressure so far in his career.
Tony's Pick: Fernando Verdasco (-102)
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