de Minaur vs Zverev Odds
| de Minaur Odds | +220 |
| Zverev Odds | -275 |
| Over/Under | 37.5 (-110o / -110u) |
| Time | How to Watch | Wednesday, 2:15 p.m. ET | Tennis Channel |
| Odds via DraftKings. For tips on how to watch the French Open, click here. | |
In the wake of Novak Djokovic's withdrawal from the 2024 French Open, we've got just one quarterfinal match on Wednesday in Paris — but it should be an utterly captivating one between Alexander Zverev and Alex de Minaur.
The German has come through back-to-back five-set matches to reach this stage and is just a win away from reaching the semifinals of this tournament for a third straight season. In his way is de Minaur, an Australian who's working on a career year which has included a surprising number of wins on clay.
Is Zverev a bit underpriced heading into this one, or might an upset finally be in the cards? Let's break down the best way to bet on Alexander Zverev vs Alex de Minaur on Wednesday.
Zverev Finding Form at the Right Time
The World No. 4 entered this tournament as one of the favorites to lift the trophy, and now that Djokovic is out of his half things have become all the more interesting. He's now a win away from squaring off with Casper Ruud in the semis, a match that appears winnable given the history between the two.
He sure does look primed to produce that matchup. Though he fumbled away a two sets-to-one lead against Tallon Griekspoor in the third round and fell behind two breaks in the deciding set, he found his best level, and that's something we've seen for nearly the entire duration of his stay here in Paris and his clay season as a whole.
Zverev has now won 10 straight matches dating back to his impressive win at the Rome Masters a couple of weeks ago, and it's taken him past the likes of Rafael Nadal, Taylor Fritz, Holger Rune and Nicolas Jarry. He's thumping his serve, as we've grown to expect, and he's coupled that with a dramatically-improved forehand which has remained strong here at the French Open, aside from a few moments where it's deserted him.
The German's now back to full fitness after taking most of last year to recover from the ankle injury he suffered at the 2022 French Open, and that's tough news for the rest of the field considering he's one of the fittest men in the world and embraces the physicality of the clay. He's also shown a ton of promise at the net over the last eight months which, in chorus with his forehand, makes him look all the more unstoppable.
de Minaur Showing New Level
Zverev isn't the only one who's added to his game over the last seven or eight months. de Minaur began to employ a backhand slice down the line during his run in Australia which saw him take out Djokovic, and it's made life difficult on his opponents.
He's also found a way to win on the clay, something he's never really done. With his wins here in Paris, he stands at 10-4 on the dirt this season — just his second winning clay season since 2018 — after going just 4-5 on clay last year. His legendary speed and defense doesn't play up quite the same on this surface, but wins are wins.
Demon's run here at the French Open has seen him take out some experienced clay-court opponents in Jaume Munar and Jan-Lennard Struff, though the latter really did look to be in a winning position before a rain delay seemed to alter the course of the match in the third round. He then stepped to Daniil Medvedev, a player with a dreadful clay record and a history of failures here in France, to win in four sets and reach his first-ever Roland Garros quarterfinal.
Zverev vs de Minaur Prediction
We've got a mismatch on our hands here, in theory.
de Minaur has failed to produce many — if any — quality wins on the clay this year despite his record and has seemed to be a bit fortunate with his draw to this point. He's spent significantly less time on court than Zverev, which is likely what the odds here reflect, but given his game doesn't really work on the clay it's certainly up for debate how well he'll play here.
The backhand slice down the line shouldn't really faze Zverev all too much given he's improved by leaps and bounds on the forehand and has routinely faced slices over the years as a very tall player. The matchup also isn't one he'll sweat given he's beaten de Minaur in seven of their nine meetings and won in straight sets the only time they played on the clay, which was two years ago in Rome.
One of the biggest things here is that the serve of de Minaur is nothing like the ones Zverev has had to deal with in his last two matches against Griekspoor and Rune. He should be able to attack the second serve with ease and shouldn't have some of the same troubles he had returning the first serve this week. If he's able to negotiate breaks here — something that seems likely given de Minaur's serve — this could be over rather quickly with the way he is hammering his first serve — and landing so many.
Zverev has thrived on physical clay matches in his career and seems to have a nearly unlimited gas tank these days. We saw his fitness wane at times last year as he built himself back up to 100%, but I think we have to treat him now like we did in early 2022. In fact, we have to rate him a bit higher given the work he's done on his volleying and forehand.
I'm going with Zverev to clean things up here and produce a handsome scoreline.
Pick: Zverev -4.5 games (-110)
