French Open Women's Day Seven Tips

French Open Women's Day Seven Tips: Cornet to end Zhang's journey

There's more third round action on the schedule today in the women's singles at the French Open, with tournament favourite Iga Swiatek headlining proceedings. Dan Weston previews the day ahead...

Tournament favourite - Swiatek likely to ease to victory

Eight third round matches are the focus with today's women's singles at Roland Garros, and the overwhelming tournament favourite, Iga Swiatek, is again what looks like a virtual bye to continue her progress. Danka Kovinic is next in line for what seems like an inevitable bakery product (bagel or breadstick) served up by the incredible talent that is Swiatek.

False underdog - Cornet against Zhang

All other pre-match favourites are priced up at 1.30 or above, so we should hopefully get some competitive action today, and we will start with the home player, Alize Cornet against Simona Halep's giantkiller, Qinwen Zhang.

Zhang's success here is somewhat unexpected. She had a wrist injury earlier in the clay season and missed events, and had only one victory on the surface in warm-up events.

However, the winter hard court season was strong for Zhang, but there's perhaps less evidence that she's as strong on clay although she did pick up an ITF title last June on the surface.

Considering this, it's perhaps surprising that she's the 1.68 favourite against the experienced home player, Alize Cornet, who has impressed so far in the tournament and picked up an excellent win over Jelena Ostapenko in round two. I find it a little strange that Cornet isn't far off the price she was against Ostapenko as she is here against Zhang, so I'm going with the Frenchwoman as an underdog today.

Unexpected success - Jeanjean needing another underdog win

I must admit I didn't know much about Leolia Jeanjean prior to this event but the French wildcard is here in round three and has had two big-priced underdog wins in the opening rounds. Today she faces Irina Begu and will need to have another underdog win if she is to continue in the tournament - the veteran Romanian is priced up at 1.42 to win. Jeanjean's clay numbers in ITFs over the last year haven't been great, so it's tough to argue with the market here.

Match of the day - Keys vs Rybakina

Finally, arguably the match of the day today is Madison Keys against Elena Rybakina. Rybakina is the favourite at 1.58, and that seems about right with her better return game with more clay warm-ups and more wins in those matches. However, Keys is very capable of a high level and shouldn't be ruled out of this, and this should be a high quality clash that will be a great watch for the neutral.