Winston Salem - New Haven QF

S Darcis - T Berdych: pick Darcis @4.6 1 unit
This odds well worth a small try.
Darcis seems on fire, reaching quarterfinal after three matches as underdog.
The hugest, no need to explain, was yesterday against Roddick.
It took two tie-break, and it's another great result give the great serve of Andy.
As I watched couple of game I must say that Darcis isn't a bad player, he uses some variation of rhythm slowing with slice backhand then hitting winners with the forehand.
And though a not great first serve percentage (61%) he conceided, and saved, only one break point.
Talking about precentages the one of Berdych's first serve was horrible: 47%. This to me mean that he's not in agreat shape, above all mentally, and mental skills are his best. If the experienced Roddick didn't manage to find a weak point in Darcis, harder will do it Berdych.
Moreover Darcis leads the head to head 2-0, with a recent 6-4 6-4 at the Olympics.

L Safarova - P Kvitova: pick Safarova @2.70 1 unit
Big surprise that they've never met, officially at least since they belong to he same tennis club and know each other very well.
Petra has had two busy week winning Montreal then losing in semifinal in Cincinnati.
Going deep also this week seems suicidal, given that US Open are next week.

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About Darcis - Berdych:
Odds were wrong? Maybe.
The match could be divided into two parts.
Against all the evidences the first part do not coincide with the first set, it was shorter.
Darcis started very well, with a solid serve and a well working plans in his mind: playing sliced backhand possibly crossed to Berdych's backhand, so that he could not accelerate; and from that scenario there were many possible way to win the point: Berdych's unforced, Darcis hitting forehand winner from baseline; one of them approaching the net, ending up with Darcis winning with a volley or passing when the opponent was a the net.
Things worked since the 5-2, with a double break in favour of belgian.
Berdych breaking back to 5-3 could be intended as a drop of tension given by the wide lead.
Darcis won the set on his service but it was just an accident: the plan he drawed was lost and he couldn't find it in the rest of the match, playing as Berdych said "back and back and by the end he was close to the fans, which is the way I need to play with the guys."

OlymPICKs III and half

The 'half' stands for the third part had to be posted yesterday: I made my picks and started writing my piece when something stopped me, I don't even remember what, and in the whole day I haven't got back on.

Here's yesterday's:

Richard Gasquet - Marcos Baghdatis: Bagh to win @3.32 1 unit

Marin Cilic - Lleyton Hewitt: Hewitt to win @3.75 1 unit

But let's go on.

Roger Federer - Denis Istomin: pick Istomin @21.00 1 unit

Yeah, it's the King facing Istomin, but even Istomin doesn't worth this. 

I don't like him, I've watched few match of him in Wimby, where he had a great run, passing through an on-fire Seppi, Andreev, Federer's nightmare Falla and losing at the R16 7-5 in the fifth against Youzhny wasting some match point.

He's nothing special in technique, apart from a decent serve, he is slow on movement and doesn't hit that hard from both side, but he play on safety, with the ball well above the net, not giving pace to his opponent, and I can neatly see the Fed make lots of unforced on these weightless balls.

John Isner - Janko Tipsarevic: pick Isner @2.25 2 units

Yet two days ago I was against Tipso, I'll try again, this time facing Isner.

Maybe it's true that the real grass-court now are only in Newport, while all the others are going nearer to all other surface, Wimbledon's groundsmen admit that bounce are higher nowadays.

But Isner is always very tricky , and above all when playing for US: some months ago he beated Federer on clay in Switzerland and reapated against France in Davis Cup. 

David Ferrer - Kei Nishikori: pick Nishikori @5.33 1 unit

Can someone stop Ferru? He's succesfully playing since Auckland in genuary. Well he do this every season, building his ranking upon lower tournament, but seeing him doing great results also on grass well... it's weird that's all.

The young US-nippon talent has played about the half of Ferrer's matches, and his style is not even that energy wasteful, he's not an hard hitter and his movements are very gently, like the bally-dancer Davydenko, who he defeated in the previous round.

This is going to be a long baseline marathon match and even though the spirit Ferrer puts in every match I think he's going to have more difficultes than the odds shows, he should try more variation than he's used to, in order to pass through this gum-wall that will hit back everything.

Steve Darcis - Nicolas Almagro: pick Darcis @3.54 1 unit

I know this is going insane but this will be the last one.

Next round the winner among the two of them will play Murray.

So even losing to Darcis will be ok, no?

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga - Feliciano Lopez: pick Lopez @3.37 2 units

Jo comes from a 25-23 in the third against Raonic, a 4 hours match.

I can imagine the rallies hadn't go beyond the 3 hits, but it's hard the same. 

Jo won't be 100% fit, and Feliciano can be thougn on grass: leftie, great service, sliced backhand and great experience.

My odds on Lopez won't have gone over @2.50

Sabine Lisicki - Maria Sharapova: pick Lisicki @3.95 2 units

Well close to 4.00... just couple of weeks ago it was a 6-4 6-3 win for Sabine.

Maybe she's not going to replicate but again I'd made much lower odds

Close to hit the target with Sabine, I reckon that Sharapova playing in the same way in every situation, her not suffering lowering of focus.
Great delusion by F.Lopez, Almagro hate me, Roger (I read) not playing well and also got a rain suspension, Ferru finally stopped by Nishi, good work by Isner in the tie-break. Saved my day.
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