MADRID
Victoria Azarenka (2.88) V Serena Williams
(1.52) Both players have been in great form
this week with Serena particulary impressive
in her demolition of Sharapova when her serve
was superb and she lost just 4 games all
match. Azarenka has been equally as impressive
and has improved since the tournament has
progressed. Today should be a tight match
but I just cannot understand why the odds
are so high on Vika considering her record
this year and the form and confidence she
has been in. Serena leads the head to head
6-1 but the majority of them have been when
Serena was at the top of the womens game
and Vika was still learning. I take Vika
to come through a tight 3 setter at fantastic
odds today.
ROME
Anna Chakvetadze (2.2) v Varvara Lepchenko
(1.74) Chakvetadze has such fragile confidence
that I cannot back her in any match with
confidence and especially on clay which is
by ar and away her least favoured surface
with a career record of 51-38. Lepchenko
menawhile has been in decent form so far
this season with a career record of 86-58
on clay and she reached the quarter final
last week in Madrid before losing in two
sets to Agnieszka Radwanska and a repeat
of the standard she showed in Madrid will
see her comfortably overcome a very vulnerable
Chakvetadze.
Silvia Soler Espinosa (1.60) V Lesia Tsurenko
(2.52) Espinosa is very much at home on clay
as her career record of 146-100 reads and
she reached the quarter finals at Estroil
earlier this year. Tsurenko although on papaer
does not have a bad 77-44 record this year
it is just a 5-4 record and she has seemed
to struggle this season. I take Espinosa
to comfortably come thorough this game with
her consistency proving too much for Tsurenko
Su Wei Hsieh (2.28) V Sloane Stephens (1.75)
Stephens struggling for form currently and
Hsieh although more of a hard court player
is playing well at the minute and again I
think she will be able to overpower her American
opponent here.
