Australian Open betting tips: Epic expected in Nadal v Medvedev final
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Australian Open betting tips and odds for Sunday‘s final
Rafael Nadal is bidding for a record-breaking 21st grand slam title on Sunday when he takes on Daniil Medvedev in the Australian Open final.
The 35-year-old Spaniard had spent the last couple of months or so contemplating retirement, but he reached his sixth Australian Open final with a four-sets victory over Matteo Berrettini.
Nadal is the 6/4 favourite to beat Medvedev, who was in trouble at one stage during his semi-final with Stefanos Tsitipas but eventually came through in four to reach the final for second successive year.
Ash Barty gave us an 8/5 winner with our headline tip on a victory by over 20.5 games in the women’s final against Danielle Collins, so let’s see how our Australian Open betting tips perform in the men’s version.
Rafael Nadal v Daniil Medvedev
Medvedev was the pre-tournament favourite once Novak Djokovic lost his court case and the second seed remains that way despite a couple of close shaves over the fortnight.
The Russian had to fight back from two sets down and faced match point against Felix-Auger-Aliassime in the last eight before launching a monumental comeback and then “lost it” in an incredible rant at the umpire late in the second set of his semi-final when he accused Tsitsipas of receiving coaching from his father Apostolos.
The US Open champion lost that set and faced two break points in the opening game of the third but recovered his poise to march into his fourth grand slam final.
Always honest 👉@DaniilMedwed #AusOpen • #AO2022 pic.twitter.com/lBWRAn8AAL
— #AusOpen (@AustralianOpen) January 28, 2022
Nadal’s struggles have been off-court with a long-standing foot problem threatening to bring the curtain down on a glorious career, but he now stands on the cusp of going one grand slam clear of great rivals Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic.
“I went through a lot of challenging moments, a lot of days of hard work without seeing a light there,” said Nadal, who also contracted coronavirus last month.
“A lot of conversations with the team, with the family, about what can happen or what’s going to happen if things continue like this, thinking that maybe it’s a chance to say goodbye.”
Indoor, outdoors 🤷♂️@RafaelNadal is just happy to be playing tennis 😄#AusOpen • #AO2022• #AOInterview pic.twitter.com/njfmyr6VAC
— #AusOpen (@AustralianOpen) January 28, 2022
Despite being the underdog, Nadal leads 3-1 in the head-to-head with the world number two, who won the last meeting at the 2020 ATP Finals.
But their biggest encounter undoubtedly tool place in the showpiece at Flushing Meadows in 2019 when Medvedev fought back from two sets and a break down to take the showpiece to a decider which Nadal took at the end of a match lasting almost five hours.
As long as Nadal’s body is healthy we could be in for another epic on Rod Laver, so 12/5 on a five-setter is one of our Australian Open betting tips.
The last three matches between these players have gone the distance, although the two most recent were both best-of-three contests at the ATP Finals.
The players shared a win apiece in London where the victor lost the opening set, so 12/5 on that happening for a third time is certainly possible.
Picking a winner looks too tough to call for Sunday’s match, so it may pay dividends to look at some of the alternative markets rather than concentrating on the result.
Over 41.5 games has its merits at 21/20 as does an opening-set tie-break at 19/10 bearing in mind three of Medvedev’s last four matches have ended 7-6 one way or another.
If arms were twisted, we would not be surprised if Medvedev went on to win in five sets at 5/1 but this is a match where anything could happen.
All odds and markets correct as of date of publication
