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Italian lucky loser Luca Vanni will take on local favorite James Ward in the Wimbledon first round.
Vanni lost a 5 setter against Saville in qualifying, but got the chance to play on the main draw after David Ferrer retired. The Italian earned the spotlight this season with his amazing run to the final at Sao Paolo and broke the Top 100 for the first time in his career, but didn’t do much else since – just a second round at Madrid and qualifying for Roland Garros. Not surprisingly, all these results came on clay, Vanni’s favorite surface. The Italian is really unfamiliar with grass, did not play a single match on the green until this season and had poor results on the surface in the last few weeks – losing to Saville (twice), Lu and only winning two matches in the Wimbledon qualifiers first two rounds.
Ward had a similar season to Vanni, as he had one big moment (beating Isner in a key Davis Cup rubber), but wasn`t able to reproduce that form. The difference is that Ward is a natural grass court player and he`s right at home here at Wimbledon, getting tons of support as a Davis Cup hero and the perennial English number 1. However, Ward passed the first round here just once – but he will surely feel that this is a golden chance to do it again. The englishman had a poor grass court campaign so far, despite his love for the surface, managing just a quarterfinal at the Manchester challenger. Nevertheless, it`s understandable why he lost to the likes of Groth, Raonic and Smyczek (taking a set from the last two).
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The two players met once before in their careers, with the Head 2 Head reading a 1-0 advantage for Ward, an easy win for him in a futures tournament back in 2008. Obviously that`s not too relevant and the only key matchup factor today is the surface, which really is a very important advantage for the English hope.
I can see Ward taking the win here. He`s at home and he always plays well in England, obviously he`ll be extra motivated and focused. While he isn`t in great form, he meets a player that isn`t playing great either and has arguably even more limitations than James. To top it off, we have a meeting between a solid grass court player and a clay courter that has no idea how to play on the green and barely took part in a handful of grass court matches in his entire career – all of them being in 2015! This really is mostly and more than anything else about Vanni’s inability to play on grass – compared with Ward’s expertise.
The surface should make the difference in this match. My tip is James Ward to win and he should get the result in no more than 4 sets. Odds are dropping on the Englishman. Prediction: Luca Vanni – James Ward 4-6 6-3 6-7 4-6.
Wimbledon live streaming from most courts available for players at Bet365.com.
Pick: Ward
Odds: 1.60 @ Unibet
Stake: 9
Possible profit: 5.4
Event date: 30 June
