How to Bet on Tennis

Tennis is a sport with increasing popularity, especially during major grand slam tournaments, and punters have the chance to place bets pretty much daily for most of the year.

Betting on Tennis

Placing a bet on a tennis match may seem like the easiest thing in the world. There are just two players, four in a doubles match, and the only result possible is that one of those will win and one will lose. But, there are still several factors to take into consideration before betting on a tennis match and also several markets which may give you a better chance of making a profit than just looking at the match result.

Factors to Consider When Betting on Tennis

As mentioned above, there are several factors to consider before betting on a tennis match which means it isn’t as simple as just ticking a box and staking your hard earned money.

1) Player Form

Player form plays a big part in deciding who you want to bet on in a tennis match, but you must also try to understand that form as well.

For example, you may have a played ranked much higher in the world rankings than their opponent but has recently had a dip in form and you think the lower ranked player may cause a shock at extremely tempting betting odds. But, what if the higher ranked player was carrying an injury which is now healed or was suffering an illness during the last couple of tournaments.

A player may have had bad form but there could be a reason behind it and may not give any hints on how they will perform now. Always try to work out why the player hit a rough patch and the same goes for good form too.

Obviously, some players go on long winning streaks but try to examine closer the level of opposition, court surface played on etc.

2) Head to Head Statistics

Head to head statistics are important in all sports, as they can determine a psychological edge. In tennis, that psychological edge may be huge due to the nature of one versus one but it’s another factor that must be looked at and evaluated properly.

Instead of looking at who has the most wins in head to head stats, it is perhaps wiser to look at previous results on the same type of surface they will be playing on, results in the last year or two, and previous encounters at the same tournament.

3) Court Surface

As mentioned in the head to head stats, the surface of a court can be extremely important.

Tennis matches can be played on grass, clay, or hard courts and certain players will perform better on a certain type of surface. If a player is a grass court specialist and is playing on grass against someone who prefers clay, form and head to head stats may be put to the background a little and preference given to the player who performs better on the surface the match is being played on.

Also something to be considered is whether the match is indoors or outdoors, for hard court matches, as this affects conditions as well and some players may not play well due to the climate of indoor matches.

Tennis Betting Markets

Along with the traditional match result market, there are several other betting markets available for tennis which give punters more variety and more chance of making a profit. These include:

• Correct Score (in sets) – Predicting the outcome of a match by sets score, for example a men’s match in a big grand slam tournament is the best of five sets so you may predict one player will win 3-1.
• Over/Under Betting – You can bet on over/under for a lot of different outcomes of a tennis match, which can include points/games won in total, number of aces in a match or by each player, total number of sets in a match, and number of games in set.
• Handicap Betting – With a player starting at a handicap of +/- a certain number of games. A red hot favourite may start with a handicap of 5.5 games. If they win the match by a set score of 6-2, 6-4, the overall game result is 12-6 and they would still win in the handicap market. But, if they won the match 6-4, 7-5, it would be an overall game score of 13-9 and the loser of the match would provide you with a winning bet in this market.

There are many more markets available for tennis matches, especially for matches during major grand slam tournaments, including in-play betting markets. These markets, available during the duration of a match, give punters the chance to bet on next ace, game score, next point, and the overall match result odds will change depending on what is happening in the match.