Australian Open Qualifying Men - Serve-heavy clash of Americans

As a bettor, you do not want to see the odds of your pick moving against you and the set handicap on Sakkari went all the way up to 2.15 before closing at 2.02 with Pinnacle. Nevertheless, the Greek got the job done and won 7-5 6-2. Today, it's time to cheer for our outright pick Sofia Kenin again.

Polluted Air in Melbourne

For our daily pick, we go to Melbourne where the qualifying for men and women started yesterday despite some real bad air conditions. The AQI (Air Quality Index) showed very unhealthy numbers throughout the day and Dalila Jakupovic was the first player that had to retire because of it. The Slovenian lead 6-4 5-6 A-40 when she got breathing difficulties and went to the ground. Genie Bouchard and Xiaodi You also had to call for the physio multiple times. You only served underarm for some time while Bouchard also struggled a lot with her breathing.

There has been a lot of criticism from players and journalists. Elina Svitolina, Gilles Simon and Kisten Flipkens among others were speaking up on social media. Despite all that, it looks like the qualifying will just continue and the AQI at least changed from "very unhealthy" to "unhealthy". The match I will preview today will be the clash between US-Americans Thai-Son Kwiatkowski and Christopher Eubanks. What already is a serve-heavy matchup might be influenced by the smoke haze even further.

Serve matters even more

While this is Eubanks' first match of the season, Kwiatkowski competed in the Noumea Challenger last week. He beat Frenchmen Bourgue and Lestienne before losing a tight three-set match against Martin Klizan. What I've seen from him last week was really solid and he seems to be a promising player for 2020.

Kwiatkowski also won the first two meetings with Eubanks, 7-6 6-3 and 7-6 6-4. Regarding our bet, the average of games they played is just where the line is at, namely 22.5. However, I'm relying on their serves to get over this number today. Eubanks has one of the biggest serves on tour, his ace rate is sitting at 14.3% over the course of his career. While Kwiatkowski isn't the best returner, he proved that he's ready for Australian Open qualifying.

As mentioned before, I do think that the air condition might be a factor in today's matches. Players are aware of it and will make holding serve their priority. As that's already the game plan of the two Americans and the courts in Melbourne play relatively quick from what I've seen, my bet is on over 22.5 games to be played.