Rome Challenger & Madrid WTA Match Previews

Rome, Italy & Madrid, Spain

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The Tennis Purist - Pete - has been a full time tennis trader on Betfair since May 2012. Pete uses his own modelling platform to analyse data and statistics from the ATP, WTA and Challenger Tour circuits, in order to execute upon profitable trading opportunities pre-match and in-play.

Londero vs Dutra Silva – Rome, Challenger Tour

These two have met twice before, with the veteran Dutra Silva winning on both occasions. Their last meeting was in Chile back in November last year, Dutra emerging victorious, 6-3 2-6 6-2.

Both of these players love the clay and are in good form, Londero has lost just 3 of his last 17 matches, and took the title in Mexico city back in April. Dutra Silva has only lost 2 of his last 8 matches on the clay, as has claimed some relatively high-profile scalps in that run, including Donaldson and Troicki.

Both players have similar serving and returning stats, however Dutra Silva’s must be held in greater esteem due to them being earned against a far superior crop of players.

Londero is likely to be the slightly more aggressive of the two players off the ground, with Dutra Silva looking to counter-punch and play his wily game from the back of the court.

This should be a good match, and I just feel like Dutra will be too much like hard work for Londero, and I expect the Brazilian to take this one.

Muguruza vs Kasatkina – Madird, WTA

This will be this pairs fourth meeting, with Muguruza leading the head to head 2-1. Kasatkina won their last encounter, this year in Dubai on the hard. The Spaniard has won their only meeting on clay, back in 2015 in Marrakech.

Muguruza looked really good after the first set of her match against Vekic last night, hitting the ball with real conviction off both sides. Apart from her withdrawal through injury during her match with Pavlyuchenkova in Stuttgart, she has only lost 2 of her last 13 matches, and has looked very assured on the clay. She will have the home crowd behind her today as well, which she will look to really thrive off.

I’m not convinced by Kasatkina on the dirt, she has had a 4-3 win-loss record this season, but i still feel like she is still finding her feet on this surface. She isn’t the best when on the defensive, and i feel like she will have to do a lot of that today against Muguruza. I also feel like the Russian’s serve is likely to get exploited today, she has only won 56% of her service points on clay recently, as apposed to Muguruza’s 60%. She has also only held serve 62% to Muguruza’s 75% – This huge disparity is likely to play a key part in today’s match.

I’m going with Muguruza to have too much firepower for Kasatkina here and take this match.