Tennis Betting Strategy: Stage of Elimination

Dean Ryan

June 1st, 2022

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The lead up to the major tennis tournaments of the year usually provides an interesting range of markets that betting sites do not price for smaller tournaments. These less common markets can be the source of attractive bets for the smart punter.

One such example is 'stage of elimination' betting markets. For the Grand Slam tournaments, it's possible to bet on which round individuals players will lose in. Whilst it's clearly not feasible to price this market for every single player, you will generally find it for the majority of the top 20 players in the world.

Player's Consistency

The key to tennis 'stage of elimination' betting is to look for players who tend to beat the opponents that you would expect them to beat, and lose to the players that you would expect them to lose to. These players will tend to progress as far as their seeding suggests and will rarely go beyond this point.

To fully explain this, let's look at an example. The Frenchman Richard Gasquet is a player that normally fluctuates between 10 and 20 in the world rankings. As a result, his usual seeding for Grand Slams would suggest that he should get to around the last 16. If we look at his results, he has actually been eliminated at the last 16 stage in the last five Grand Slam events, and in eight of the last ten Grand Slams. Virtually every time, he beats players that he should beat, before losing to one of the top eight seeds. Stage of elimination betting could be a profitable strategy here.

The 'Big Four'

This can also be a market worth looking at for the biggest players. Roger Federer is still a fixture in the 'big four', despite a slight decline in recent years. He remains favourite to beat any player outside the elite group, although he has been outclassed in the majority of his latest encounters with Novak Djokovic, and recently lost to Andy Murray. Backing him to be eliminated in the semi-finals could therefore be a good strategy. In fact, he has lost at this stage in five of his last nine Grand Slam appearances.

'Round Reached' Market

There are alternatives to this market if you're less confident about selecting a specific round for stage of elimination betting. Many tennis betting sites offer markets on players to reach a certain round, regardless of whether they then win or lose at that stage. In the case of someone like Richard Gasquet, who consistently reaches the last 16, this could be a profitable market, depending on the odds offered.

'Progression Match' Market

Another possibility in tennis betting is 'progression match' bets. Here, the bookmaker offers odds on which of two players will progress the furthest in a tournament. It is important to note whether the particular bookmaker offers a tie option, or whether bets will be void if they are both eliminated in the same round.

Again here, it is simply a matter of determining how far you expect each player to progress – whether you prefer the steady, consistent player, who should reach a set round, or whether you opt for the streaky player, who could go far in the tournament, or who could lose in the opening round.

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