The highlight of the tennis calendar starts next week as the world’s best tennis players compete in the Wimbledon Tennis Championships.
Roger Federer is looking to make Wimbledon history by going one better than Bjorn Borg and winning the Wimbledon men’s title for a sixth year in a row.
Betfair and Betdaq have the Swiss superstar at 24/19* to win again this year. All of the major bookmakers have Federer as favourite as he has dominated grass court tennis over the past five or six years.
Bookmakers feel his closest challenge will again come from Spain’s Rafael Nadal. The Spaniard defeated Federer on the clay court surface in the French Open Final. Nadal always seems to have the edge over Federer on clay but when it comes to grass Federer is still superior to the 21 year-old Nadal – who has only been playing on grass for three years.
However, Nadal has had excellent preparation on grass for this year’s Wimbledon as he won his first major title on the surface at the weekend. He defeated Novac Djokovic in the final of the Stella Artois tournament at Queens Club in London. This tournament is seen as a great warm-up to Wimbledon with several players who won at Queens going on to lift the Wimbledon trophy. Can Nadal join the likes of McEnroe, Becker and Sampras?
Although Federer wasn’t participating at Queens, he will have kept a close eye on Nadal.
The Spaniard is 37/13* with both Betfair and Betdaq to spoil the Federer party.
Serbian, Novak Djokovic is the third favourite. He has also had some good practice on grass by reaching the final at Queens and giving Nadal a good run for his money.
The current best price for Djokovic is 22/5* with Betfair. America’s Andy Roddick is 39/1* to claim his first Wimbledon men’s singles title also with Betfair.
And what of the British challenge? Well Tim Henman has called it a day and won’t be making another bold effort to become the first British men’s singles winner since Fred Perry.
The baton has well and truly been passed on to Andy Murray as Britain’s best chance of ending a winning drought which goes back to the 1930s.
Murray has beaten Federer earlier this year albeit on a hardcourt. He is currently ranked No.11 in the world but with the home crowd cheering him on bookmakers have him as the fifth favourite for Wimbledon.
He is eager to do well after missing out on last year’s Wimbledon due to a wrist injury.
If you’d like to back a Brit to win Betfair and Betdaq have Murray at 49/1*.
Maria Sharapova is favoured by bookmakers to take the ladies singles title.
The Russian is 14/5* with Betfair to repeat her success of 2004.
The Williams sisters are then the next two women fancied by bookmakers to triumph at Wimbledon. Serena is second favourite at 43/10* with Betdaq with older sister Venus priced at 31/5* also with Betdaq.
Ana Ivanovic is 24/5* with Betdaq to win her first Wimbledon and Jelena Jankovic is 33/2* with both Betdaq and Betfair.
Former winner Lindsay Davenport is the eighth favourite with odds of 47/1* with Betdaq.
