French Open Day Two Women's Tips

French Open Day Two Women's Tips: Question marks surrounding many big names

Day two of the French Open sees 24 further women's singles matches on the schedule, and returning to discuss the day ahead is our tennis columnist, Dan Weston...

Tauson among victors on opening day

Angelique Kerber was arguably the highest-profile casualty on day one of the French Open, albeit without being a short-priced favourite as she was beaten pretty straightforwardly by the Ukrainian qualifier, Anhelina Kalinina. The likes of Petra Kvitova, Victoria Azarenka, Naomi Osaka and our long-shot quarter three winner selection, Clara Tauson, all emerged victorious on the opening day. Tauson now faces Azarenka in round two on Wednesday.

Andreescu and Serena difficult to quantify in advance

The Monday schedule in Paris looks pretty trappy, with some players looking like value but with question marks around their matches. For example, based on her clay level in the past and opponent Bianca Andreescu's withdrawal in Strasbourg last week, Tamara Zidansek has chances at 3.00 but the Canadian, Andreescu, is something of an intangible on clay given her lack of previous career activity on the surface but high level on hard courts and huge future career upside.

It's also fairly difficult to ascertain the likely level of Serena Williams in advance of the tournament, but based on her two-year numbers she looks pretty accurately priced at 1.37 to defeat Irina Begu, who is a pretty competent clay-courter. Kiki Bertens, who has had injury issues but is a very strong clay-courter at her best, also is fairly unquantifiable for her match against Polona Hercog.

Trevisan and Blinkova could be value underdogs

In some of the lower-profile matches, there is a clash of out of form players as Alison Van Uytvanck meets Martina Trevisan. The Belgian, Van Uytvanck, has lost her last five and Trevisan has lost eight of her last nine, but one the runs has to improve today when they face each other. I quite like Trevisan at 2.34 to get an underdog victory.

Anna Blinkova is another one who has lost five from five and had an injury which forced her to withdraw from Stuttgart in April - she's only played once since the Miami Open in March. In normal circumstances, the 2.34 about her against the American qualifier, Hailey Baptiste, would be generous - let's see.

Swiatek and Muguruza among big names in action

As you can probably see, the spots where numbers indicate some potential value actually have some caveats surrounding them, so today's card - as is often the case for round one matches - is pretty tough and I'm not particularly convinced about anything here.

In other matches, tournament favourite Iga Swiatek is 1.05 to get the better of Kaja Juvan, who does possess some future potential herself, while Elise Mertens should progress at the expense of Storm Sanders. Garbine Muguruza faces the talented Ukrainian player, Marta Kostyuk, and it will be interesting to see how far Kostyuk can push her this afternoon, particularly given Muguruza's recent injury issues. Finally, British interest features Heather Watson and Jo Konta, who are both slight underdogs against Zarina Diyas and Sorana Cirstea, respectively.