Alcaraz
Coco Gauff? Gone. Jessica Pegula? Out. Jasmine Paolini, Qinwen Zheng, Madison Keys? Yet more top seeds who fell in the first week at Wimbledon. And it wasn’t much different on the men’s side: Half of the top eight seeds went down to defeat. It’s been almost 25 years since so many seeded players lost in the first three rounds of a major.
Onwards now to the quarterfinals, and the championship weekend ahead. Will more underdogs prevail? Or will the remaining seeded players exert their dominance?
On the women’s side, the first-round loss by Gauff hit bettors the hardest. Almost 10 per cent of wagers at BetMGM were placed on the American, who arrived at Wimbledon with tremendous confidence and a French Open championship in hand.
The carnage has left Aryna Sabalenka as the prohibitive favourite. At the BetMGM sportsbook, the Belarussian star entered at +290 to win her first Wimbledon title. She now stands at -155, well ahead of No. 8 Iga Swiatek (+400), who on Monday won in straight sets in the Round of 16. Upstart American Amanda Anisimova, the No. 13 seed, is the not-too-distant third choice at +800. Anisimova plays unseeded Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the quarterfinals.
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On the men’s side, the elite players have endured, but not without missteps.
No. 2 seed Carlos Alcaraz is now the +115 favourite at BetMGM to take home a third championship title at the All England Club. Though he has not necessarily been on his very best form, Alcaraz — who hasn’t lost a match since April — displayed his trademark tenacity in rallying from a deficit in the Round of 16. He will face off in the quarters against Britain’s last remaining hope, the world No. 61 Cameron Norrie (+6600).
The stars would appear to be aligned for Alcaraz to face off in the finals against rival — and No. 1 seed — Jannik Sinner, the +135 second choice who on Monday advanced to the quarters despite being down two sets to Grigor Dimitrov (Dimitrov retired with a pectoral injury). But if the first week of Wimbledon taught us anything, it’s that no top seed is safe.
Certainly, Novak Djokovic is aiming to thwart the Alcaraz-Sinner storyline. The seven-time Wimbledon champion surged back from a dismal first set — he won only a single game, his worst performance ever in an opening set at Wimbledon — to defeat No. 11 seed Alex De Minaur in four sets.
Now 38, Djokovic is the third-oldest man in the Open era to move through to the quarters at Wimbledon. At +375 at BetMGM, he continues to be seen as something of a long shot to capture his 25th Grand Slam title. Then again, this has so far been the tournament of the underdog.