The 2021 Qatar ExxonMobil Open is one of the ATP 250 tournaments with an overall prize pool of $787,930. Twenty-eight players are participating, including three of the game’s top ten: Andrey Rublev, Roger Federer and Dominic Thiem. Federer is returning from a 13-month injury recovery period, coming back at the age of 39. Normally, the Qatar Open is not as widely followed in the online betting community, but Federer’s return makes this event have much more interest than usual. Other players in the field include David Goffin, Stan Wawrinka, Reilly Opelka, Aslan Karatsev, Borna Coric, Denis Shapovalov and Roberto Bautista Agut. Thiem is the top seed, leading the draw’s top half, while Federer holds the second seed and leads the bottom half of the draw.
We have some ATP Tennis Betting thoughts about the tournament for your consideration.
Tennis News: ATP Qatar ExxonMobil Open Preview
With only 28 players, the top four seeds (Thiem, Federer, Rublev and Shapovalov) all have byes to the round of 16. In the top half of the draw, the seeded players include Thiem, Rublev, Bautista Agut and Wawrinka. If form holds, then Thiem would meet Rublev in the semifinal for this side of the draw. However, Thiem has some tough tests to pass before he gets there. He would either face Aslan Karatsev or Mubarak Shannan Zayid, a Qatari crowd favorite, in the second round. Karatsev rolled all the way to the semifinals of the Australian Open, where he finally saw his Cinderella story end in straight sets against Novak Djokovic.
An interesting sleeper on this side of the draw is Alexander Bublik. He beat Alexander Zverev at the Rotterdam Open and gets to face a qualifier in the first round in Qatar. If he can get by the qualifier, he would play the winner of Bautista Agut and Reilly Opelka. The next step would be a potential quarterfinal match with Thiem. Bautista Agut is the favorite to meet Thiem at that point, but Bautista Agut could struggle with either Bublik or Opelka.
Rublev faces the winner of Richard Gasquet and a qualifier in the round of 16. Rublev defeated Marton Fucsovics to win the Rotterdam Open, so he has his game right where he wants it right now. Wawrinka begins with a qualifier, which is a much softer first round than what he faced in Rotterdam, where the eighth seed went down in straight sets to Karen Khachanov. Fucsovics, fresh off that Rotterdam final, meets Dusan Lajovic in the first round. If he wins that, then he would see the winner of Wawrinka and that qualifier. If Rotterdam drained too much gas out of Rublev’s tank, then he might not make it to the semifinal.
The bottom half is led by Federer, who would face the winner of Jeremy Chardy and Dan Evans in the second round. This could mean a stiff test for Federer right away, as well as Chardy has played in recent matches. He won four in a row at the Rotterdam Open to get all the way to the quarterfinals, beating David Goffin and pushing Rublev to a third set, losing 4-6. Evans went down in the first round of the Australian Open, falling to Cameron Norrie. However, he has been training with Federer for a few weeks now, so he knows the legend’s game.
John Millman opens against Nikoloz Basilashvili. The winner will advance to meet the winner between Malek Jaziri and Borna Coric. Coric went down to Fucsovics in the semifinals of the Rotterdam Open, but just getting there shows that he has gotten back on top of his game. Coric has always played Federer tough.
Denis Shapovalov looks set to face fellow compatriot Vasek Pospisil in the second round, as Pospisil has a qualifier in the first round. In the last two first-round matches in this draw, Goffin plays Filip Krajinovic, and Taylor Fritz takes on Lorenzo Sonego. It’s a tricky path out of this half of the draw for Federer, particularly as he will have a bit of rust to shake off along the way.
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