We're looking at a marvelous day of tennis on Friday after watching a plethora of matches on Thursday, and there are star-studded matchups up and down this slate.
I'll be looking at two of those, each featuring a rising young American, though while I think one will have success I'm ready to fade the other.
Here are my French Open betting picks for Shelton vsAuger-Aliassime and Korda vs Alcaraz.
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French Open Betting Picks
Ben Shelton (+145) vs Felix Auger-Aliassime (-180)
10 a.m. ET
I think you have to trust the line here. Yes, Auger-Aliassime had a very poor 2023 campaign and Shelton's made significant strides on the clay, but I don't feel the American is quite ready yet to make a run at Roland Garros with more seasoning required.
While we think of both players here as erratic and highly volatile players who do their best work on hard courts where they can dominate with their power, Auger-Aliassime has not only played more matches on clay this year than Shelton, but has won a higher percentage of them with 11 wins in 15 tries. On top of that, four of Shelton's wins came in Houston, which doesn't have clay that is anything like what we see in Europe, and Auger-Aliassime has a wealth of clay-court experience dating back to his rise to the top 100 in 2018.
The Canadian pocketed a quality win over Casper Ruud weeks ago in Madrid and to this point in the tournament has done incredibly well in the face of two solid defenders in Yoshi Nishioka and Henry Squire, dropping just one set in his run to the third round. Shelton, meanwhile, has gone just 3-4 on European clay this year, even counting his two wins here in Paris — the first of which came in a close match against Hugo Gaston and the second came on retirement over Kei Nishikori in another nail biter.
I think Auger-Aliassime has looked the more convincing of the two on this surface in 2024 and he should come into this one with a world of confidence with so much experience to draw from. He should advance to the fourth round of the French Open for the second time in three years.
Pick: Auger-Aliassime -2.5 games (-105)
Sebastian Korda (+550) vs Carlos Alcaraz (-750)
2:15 p.m. ET
This has the potential to be a career-defining match for Sebastian Korda. Back at the site of his first career breakthrough, which came with three wins at the 2020 French Open, he's matched up against a wounded World No. 3 who he's seen three times already in his career on the ATP Tour.
Korda stepped to Alcaraz at the Monte Carlo Masters two years ago to take him out in three sets, becoming one of very few who can claim to have beaten the Spaniard on clay over the last three seasons and doing so at his first time of asking. He'd wind up falling at the French Open just a couple of months later in straight sets, but given Alcaraz reached the semifinals there as the proverbial co-favorite leading up to the tournament, it's safe to say he was at or very close to the peak of his powers.
It's hard to say that Alcaraz is there now. He fell to Andrey Rublev at just the quarterfinal stage in Madrid, and he went on to pull out of Rome due to an arm injury. This is big news when you consider Alcaraz has had noticeable issues with his right arm through the years and needs a full bill of health to produce the deadly forehand that makes him one of the best in the world.
He hasn't exactly inspired confidence here in Paris, either, coming through a shockingly close match against Jesper De Jong in a four-set victory last round. Yes, he did quickly dispatch of JJ Wolf in the first round, but if you've followed Wolf over the years you'd know he's clay-averse, and he did enter this tournament with a 7-14 record across all levels this season after dropping his final qualifying match.
This will be the first real test of the tournament for Alcaraz, and given he's a bit compromised in the health department and up against a guy who's not only defeated him before but has come up with a few quality wins this clay season to build form and confidence, I think he'll drop a set at the very least.
Pick: Korda +2.5 sets (+100)
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