Murray survives scare to progress to third round of Paris Masters
Published:Andy Murray booked his place in the third round of the BNP Paribas Masters, but had to come from a set down after Argentine David Nalbandian threatened to derail Murray’s title hopes.
Nalbandian was unable to convert his first set advantage into a win and Murray overturned the first set lead to win 2-6, 6-4, 6-3.
The Scot will now face Marian Cilic in the third round after the Frenchman beat Sergiy Stakhovsky in a match that also went the full three sets.
Murray is 3/10 to beat the Frenchman while Cilic is 12/5 to beat Murray.
Gael Monfils vs Fernando Verdasco
As the tournament enters the latter stages, Fernando Verdasco moves ever closer to securing a spot in the ATP Tour finals but in Gael Monfils, Verdasco faces an opponent he has never beaten.
The two have only met once and it was on clay, not the hard courts of Paris, but Monfils will hold that psychological edge over Verdasco and is 8/15 to win.
Monfils has been in tremendous form recently making two finals in his last four tournaments, while Verdasco has been poor, ending a four match losing streak in Valencia last week before exiting in the next round.
That would explain why Verdasco is as long as 11/8 to beat Monfils, but with the added incentive of a place in London to fight for, Verdasco may just find the extra motivation to register the victory.
Andy Roddick vs Ernests Gulbis
Roddick holds a 2-0 head-to-head record over his Latvian opponent and is 1/3 to win and progress to the fourth round.
This is Gulbis’ first appearance in the second round in four tournaments and at odds of 9/4, the BNP Paribas betting market believes that Roddick should progress easily.
A 2-0 win for Roddick offers a little value in the betting market at 11/10.
Murray holds a 3-1 head-to-head record over Cilic. See the full BNP Paribas Masters betting odds here.
