Tennis
The modern game of tennis originated in the late 19th century as "lawn tennis", which has roots in an ancient game called real tennis. The game was extremely popular among the upper class throughout the English-speaking world.
In these early days of tennis, professionals were banned from playing in the major tournaments, which were only open to amateur players. When it was discovered that amateurs were accepting money under the table this rule was thrown out thus starting the open era of tennis. All players were allowed to compete in all tournaments. These new open rules along with the establishment of an international professional circuit and the selling of television rights across the world led to an increase in popularity for the sport. It shed its upper/middle class English speaking image and opened up to all ages and classes across the world.
As you may know, tennis is played on a court that can be either grass (Wimbledon), clay (French Open) or a hardcourt (Australian or US Open) made of either concrete or asphalt. Players, both men and women, can play as Singles or Doubles.
There are four major tournaments in tennis, collectively known as the Grand Slam tournaments. They are the Australian Open, the French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open. These four tournaments are the most prestigious events in the sport and have roots that date back to 1877. Players strive to achieve success in these four tournaments as they are so highly regarded in the tennis world.
On the men's side of things, Rod Laver is the only player that has won all four titles in one year. He did it twice, once in 1962 and again in 1969. Three women have won all four titles in one year. They are Maureen Connolly Bringer in 1953, Margaret Court in 1970 and Steffi Graf in 1988. Graf also won the Olympic gold medal in 1988, giving her a "Golden" Grand Slam title.
The top five men’s singles Grand Slam performers at the time of writing this article are:
- Roger Federer – 15 wins
- Pete Sampras – 14 wins
- Roy Emerson – 12 wins
- Rod Laver – 11 wins
- Bjorn Borg – 11 wins
The top five women’s singles performers at the time of writing this article are:
- Margaret Smith Court – 24 wins
- Steffi Graf – 22 wins
- Helen Wills Moody – 19 wins
- Chris Evert – 18 wins
- Martina Navratilova – 18 wins
Because of its increased popularity, tennis has seen some action among online sportsbooks. There are a couple of different options when it comes to betting on tennis, the most popular include matchups and betting on sets or handicaps.
Betting on the matchups is similar to betting on the Money Line in other sports. You are simply betting on who is going to win the match. The Money Line will traditionally look like this:
- Tommy Haas: +900
- Roger Federer: -2500
In this case, Federer is the favorite. If you want to bet on Federer to win, you would need to put down $2500 to win $100. Haas is the underdog in this scenario. The underdog bet tells you how much money you will win if you put down $100. So, in this case, if you put down $100 on Haas to win, you would receive $900 plus your original bet.
Some sportsbooks will also offer odds on sets or handicap betting. This is similar to betting on the Spread in other sports. Tennis handicaps look like this:
- Tommy Haas: +1.5 +259
- Roger Federer: -1.5 -279
In this case, if you bet on Federer and he won in 4 sets to 1 or 3 sets to 0, you would have a winning bet. Any other result would mean that the Haas bet would be the winner.
Tennis Betting Tips
There are a few things to keep in mind while deciding on where you want to put your money. First of all, you’ll want to do a little research to familiarize yourself with the players. The more you know about the players, the more you will know about how they perform, what their weaknesses might be, etc.
Next, consider the rank of each player and their recent performances. Tennis players are ranked based on how well they have performed in the previous 52 weeks. They are awarded points based on how far they advance in a tournament and the level of the tournament. The rank is currently calculated by totaling the points that players receive from 13 mandatory tennis events (4 Grand Slams and 9 ATP Masters Series tournaments). So, obviously the better the players perform, the higher their ranking will be.
You’ll also want to look into what type of surface the game is on. The surface has an effect on how the ball bounces and how the players move. If you know that a certain player is bad at moving across clay courts, you may not want to put your bet on them.
Recent injuries are another good thing to consider when putting down a bet on tennis. If a player is just returning from an injury, odds are they probably won’t be playing their best and it could take them a few matches to get back into the swing of things.
If you’d like to learn more about betting on tennis, check out our Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon and/or US Open pages. Or, if you’d rather just get right into the action, visit one of our many recommended sportsbooks.
