Sporting Selections September 04

Archived results for September 2004

Date & Time
of entry

Monaco to bt Verdasco

Verdasco is over-hyped in our eyes and it appears StanJames think he is past the post here. Monaco has a hardcourt victory over Verdasco this year and on his favoured red stuff we take the young Argentine to succeed

It has been quite some time since Safin won a final. Paris 2002 to be exact(if we exclude the Davis Cup) and there must be some doubts here. Youzhny is arguably in better form and we are surprised to see the prices so varied. Chandlers make Youzhny 6/5.

Acasuso to win outright

Hard to split the remaining foursome and the Argentine is the value. He loves it here. A semi finalist and a runner up these last two years, he does not have a losing record v any of the remaining players and is fresher than most having played very little tennis recently

Lee to bt Srichaphan

The smiling Thai has not been in his usual strong form this hardcourt season. He has lost some strange matches and in what will be the Final to many in the Far East, we take the Korean to win.

Nieminen to bt Nalbandian

Two players struggling to find some form at the end of the year. They have played a fair few times and it has been close. This price is way too big

Koubek to bt Hanescu

The Romanian on home soil and certain to be giving it 100% but he will probably need to. We make Koubek a slight fav here and although he is prone to "mental lapses", he is nicely into this event.

Henman to beat Kiefer

The books do like to take an opinion about the British number one and so do we!! Despite Kiefer being in great form,his game seems to match up well for Henman. "Tiger" should still be fav here. With Henmans back not 100%, take the bet with a match complete bookmaker.

Rochus to beat Hrbaty

The little Belgian have shown tremendous fighting spirit already in New York. He will always find it tough to succeed with his height and weight limitations but his heart is in the right place! We like his chances here

Youzhny to bt Nalbandian

Nalbandian has struggled this year with a number of niggling injuries. His limited preparation for this years US Open includes a loss to Youzhny and having watched his 1st round match v Van Scheppingen, it is clear the Argentine is well short of his best.

Volandri to bt Canas

These guys have met up 4 times already this year so familiarity is hardly a problem. Canas surprisingly has not played a hardcourt event in the run up to US Open. Volandri prefers to see red under his feet but this price is too generous to refuse.

Kiefer is tough to beat at present. He has been in solid form for most of the hardcourt season but to our mind still remains a fragile sort. Saulnier showed plenty of fight v Rusedski and this price is a touch high

2 players who have had interrupted years. Dent is one dimensional and several times this year when his serve has went missing he has been awful. Mathieu playing himself back into decent form. Their only previous meeting was tight. Expect this one to be also