In-form Isner to take Nadal the distance in Cincinnati final

Rafael Nadal remains in imperious form in 2013, having won every single match he’s played since that shock first round Wimbledon exit to Steve Darcis.

The victory over Tomas Berdych in the semi-final of the Cincinnati Masters made it nine straight wins on hard courts, and he rightly enters the final against world no. 22 John Isner as the 1/6 favourite.

But the 6ft 10ins American is in good form too, and Nadal will be in no doubt that he’ll have to work hard for what would be a third tournament victory of the season on the hard stuff.

Isner beat Milos Raonic, Novak Djokovic and Juan Martin Del Potro – three top 10 players – en route to the final, his third in the last month following appearances in the showpiece events at hard court tournaments in Atlanta and Washington.

Having taken at least a set off Nadal in two of their three meetings, the 10/3 on offer for the Spaniard to win the contest 2-1 certainly looks tempting, as does evens for there to be over 23.5 games and 12/5 for there to be three sets in the match.

In the women’s final later in the day, all eyes will rightly be on the 1/4 Serena Williams against Victoria Azarenka, especially as the American has won 28 of her 30 hard court clashes this year.

Williams holds a 12-2 career record against the Belarusian, although the last three completed matches on hard courts have featured at least 20 games, with over 20.5 in this one available at evens.

Azarenka won one of those matches and took a set in the other, making the 10/3 available for a 2-1 Williams win look pretty tasty.

All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publication