We’ve got another week of top quality tennis on our hands with three ATP Tour events on the cards. There’s two ATP 250 tournaments being played in Marseille (Open 13) and Delray Beach (Delray Beach Open), but our focus here today is on the most prestigious of the the three, which is the Rio Open in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
2019 ATP Rio Open Betting Picks
The Rio Open is an ATP 500 event that’s part of the South American clay court swing in the lead up to the French Open. It is played in Brazil’s capital city, Rio de Janeiro, and is the first clay court event of the year worth 500 ATP rankings points. The Rio Open was first held in 2014, where the worlds best ever clay court player in Rafael Nadal won the title. Since then, we’ve seen four other winners that include David Ferrer (2015), Pablo Cuevas (2016), Dominic Thiem (2017), and Diego Schwartzman (2018). No one has ever won the Rio Open on multiple occasions as we enter the sixth edition of the event since its ATP Tour inception.
2019 Rio Open Seeds
Top Half
The top half of the draw seems fairly thin at first glance. The main hope here is Dominic Thiem, who comes in to after a semifinal appearance in Buenos Aires last week and opens as the odds on favourite Rio. The other likely contender on this side of the draw looks to be Marco Cecchinato. The Italian clay court gem won the title in Argentina last week and holds the third seed in this tournament. The only other man we see pushing these two in the early rounds is Joao Sousa, who plays his best tennis during this swing every season.
Bottom Half
The bottom half of the draw is a bit deeper and is headline by little Argentinian workhorse Diego Schwartzman. He’s coming off a great week in Argentina where he defeated Thiem in three sets to make the final, but eventually lost to Cecchinato. Another great chance is Fabio Fognini, who hasn’t had an ideal start to the season, but is more than capable of making a deep run if he can find anything close to his best form.
Prediction
It’s certainly a top heavy draw at the Rio Open this year with four high ranked players seeming the main threat for the title. However, the one that stands out the most is World Number 8 Dominic Thiem of Austria. He reached the semifinals in Buenos Aires last week and should be a bit fresher than a couple of the other guys who played in finals on Sunday. He’s also the second best clay court player in the world and should be too good for this field if he finds something close to his best.
Dominic Thiem Title +175 888sport
