Nadal reaches semis; Djokovic falls in French quarters

Tennis Betting Lines

06/02/2010 - Paris, France (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Four-time champion Rafael Nadal was tested in his quarterfinal victory, while third-seeded Serbian star Novak Djokovic was stunned by Austrian Jurgen Melzer at the French Open on Wednesday.

The second-seeded former world No. 1 Nadal got past 19th-seeded fellow Spaniard Nicolas Almagro 7-6 (7-2), 7-6 (7-2), 6-4, while a 22nd-seeded Melzer prevented a Nadal-Djokovic semifinal with a grueling come-from-behind five-set victory over Djokovic on Day 11 at Roland Garros.

Following a pair of tiebreaks, Nadal got the break of serve he needed to grab a 5-4 lead against Almagro in the third set. Then, serving for a spot in the semifinals, Nadal converted on his second match point when Almagro sailed one final backhand long. Almagro saved a first match point, trailing 30-40, with a tremendous backhand winner. Almagro possesses one of the best one-handed backhands on the tour.

Nadal, who had his serve broken only once on Wednesday, prevailed in 2 hours, 35 minutes. He broke Almagro on two occasions.

The "King of Clay" will meet his fellow southpaw Melzer in the semifinals here on Friday. The Spaniard is 2-0 lifetime against the Austrian.

Nadal is a six-time major champion, with four of his titles coming right here in Paris from 2005-08. He topped his great rival Roger Federer in three straight French Open finals from 2006-08 before losing to Swede Robin Soderling in the fourth round here a year ago. Soderling stunned a top-seeded Federer here on Tuesday.

The amazing Nadal, who will turn 24 on Thursday, is now 36-1 lifetime at Roland Garros, with his only loss coming at the hands of the big-hitting Soderling.

The lefthanded Melzer dropped the first two sets before charging back to stun the former Aussie Open champion and former world No. 2 Djokovic 3-6, 2-6, 6-2, 7-6 (7-3), 6-4. Melzer had never even reached the fourth round at a Grand Slam event prior to this fortnight.

Melzer climbed back into the match Wednesday by cruising in the third set and squeaking out the fourth via tiebreak, which was all Melzer, as he charged out to a 6-0 lead before taking it in 7-3 fashion.

In the fifth and final set, things were all square at 4-4 before Melzer broke Djokovic on his third break point of the ninth game. Djokovic netted a backhand to give the Austrian the break after saving two other break points, including the second one via overhead winner.

Melzer would outlast Djokovic in the next game by holding his serve. The Austrian blew his first match point by tapping a forehand volley into the net, despite having a wide-open court in front of him.

Djokovic saved a second match point, but a third one proved to be the charm for the 29-year-old Melzer, who advanced when the Serb sent a forehand return long after 4 hours, 15 minutes of entertaining tennis.

Melzer won despite going only four-of-24 on a bevy of break-point chances.

The 23-year-old Djokovic, who shares a May 22 birthday with Melzer, failed in his attempt to reach a third semi here in four years.

Friday's other men's semifinal will pit a fifth-seeded Soderling against 15th- seeded Czech Tomas Berdych. The 6-foot-4 Soderling is 4-3 all-time against the 6-foot-5 Berdych, but the Czech captured their lone clay-court encounter three years ago.

Berdych will appear in his first-ever Grand Slam semifinal, while Soderling will play in his second, with both coming here in Paris over the last two years.

Soderling lost to Federer in last year's French Open finale.

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Sportsbook Betting Lines

Who Makes the Sportsbook Betting Lines?

Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.

“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.

“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “

What are the Football Betting Lines Trying to Accomplish?

There is a common misconception that point spreads represent the oddsmakers’ prediction of how many points the favorite will win by. That is not the case at all – their intent is NOT to evenly split the ATS result between the teams; rather, their goal is to attract equal betting action on both sides. Stated another way, they want to create a line that half the people find appealing to bet one way while the other half find it appealing to bet the other way (known as ‘dividing the action’).

Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).

How the Opening Line Is Made

The opening line is the first line created by the oddsmakers, which is then sent out to sportsbooks. Of course there is an entire method to the madness on how the opening line is created. Seba explained that it all starts with each oddsmaker creating a line on each game based upon their own personal approach. This usually includes having up-to-date power ratings on each team.

Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.

Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.

Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.

The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.

A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.

Why Sports Betting Lines Change

Once the opening line is released by LVSC, the individual sportsbooks decide if they want to make any adjustments before offering it to the public. Reasons for such adjustments include:

Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game

Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)

The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.

Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.

For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.

Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."

“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”

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