Does the market take age into account in WTA Tennis?

Does the market take age into account in WTA Tennis?

By Dan Weston Feb 27, 2014

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Tennis bettors may not consider the age of a player when deciding to back them. This article assesses whether the age of players in the WTA has any influence, and if there is generally any tennis betting value backing younger players.

WTA Rising Stars offer value

In last week’s article which looked at the ‘choke’ factor – whether heavy underdogs choke when playing more illustrious opponents – we found that the WTA had a much better record for underdog wins than the ATP.

One possible reason given was that there is a bigger talent pool of young players in the WTA with nine players under 23 inside the top 50, and 29 inside the top 100. With the latest rankings this has changed to 10 inside the top 50, and 25 inside the top 100 – compared to just one ATP player in the top 50 and six in the top 100.

Simona Halep (current rank 7) leads the young WTA players, with Sloane Stephens (18) and Eugenie Bouchard (19) also having a top 20 ranking currently.

These young WTA players clearly are relatively more talented than their young ATP counterparts and when breaking through on the main tour, may well be underestimated by the betting markets. Therefore they may have the potential to cause an upset at a large price.

The following table shows the records of WTA players inside the top 100 in WTA matches in the last 12 months (data correct at 26th February 2014). Because of the potential for upset wins to come via retirement (hence there would be no relevant choke factor) only completed matches were assessed. All prices were Pinnacle Sports’ closing prices, and level 100 stakes were applied for all matches.

Player

Rank

Best Win (Opponent)

Best Win (Price)

WTA Matches

12 Month W/L

Win %

12 Month P/L

ROI

Halep

7

Agnieszka Radwanska

3.394

74

58-16

78.38

2265

32.4

Stephens

18

Maria Sharapova

5.023

52

32-20

61.54

10

0.2

Bouchard

19

Ana Ivanovic

4.859

61

40-21

65.57

373

6.2

Pavlyuchenkova

22

Maria Sharapova

5.289

56

35-21

62.50

602

11.4

Muguruza

36

Caroline Wozniacki

4.859

49

36-13

73.47

1076

22.4

Keys

38

Na Li

13.000

53

31-22

58.49

1010

19.8

Jovanovski

42

Andrea Petkovic

6.355

48

28-20

58.33

830

17.7

Svitolina

44

Romina Oprandi

4.077

48

23-25

47.92

38

0.8

Nara

48

Klara Zakopalova

3.945

35

23-12

65.71

829

25.1

Beck

49

Lucie Safarova

4.809

58

30-28

51.72

-252

-4.5

Karolina Pliskova

51

Nadia Petrova

4.859

50

23-27

46.00

-425

-8.5

Robson

56

Agnieszka Radwanska

7.025

34

15-19

44.12

-272

-8.2

Puig

58

Sara Errani

7.446

44

24-20

54.55

557

13

Davis

64

Svetlana Kuznetsova

4.489

47

25-22

53.19

690

15

Cepelova

65

Sam Stosur

6.386

36

17-19

47.22

97

2.7

Torro Flor

66

Marina Erakovic

3.178

42

19-23

45.24

-570

-14

McHale

70

Polona Hercog

2.538

40

20-20

50.00

-724

-18

Schmiedlova

72

Alize Cornet

4.322

45

27-18

60.00

308

7

Tomljanovic

74

Kseniz Pervak

4.165

35

21-24

60.00

651

19.1

Mladenovic

76

Simona Halep

6.068

43

15-28

34.88

-1264

-30

Ormaechea

81

Anna Schmiedlova

3.188

36

19-17

52.78

-673

-19

Giorgi

82

Caroline Wozniacki

6.402

34

20-14

58.82

671

20.3

Pfizenmaier

84

Nadia Petrova

2.855

30

17-13

56.67

355

12.3

Babos

94

Ana Ivanovic

8.634

31

12-19

38.71

-176

-5.9

Doi

97

Varvara Lepchenko

2.912

36

15-21

41.67

-972

-28

Overall

1117

625-492

55.95

5034

4.51

Halep undervalued by the market

We can see from the above table that overall there was a positive return blindly backing under 23 WTA players who are currently in the top 100 with a return of investment of 4.51% being generated.

Unsurprisingly, the top ranked player, Simona Halep, performed the best, with a stellar season seeing her with the highest win percentage (78.38%) and the highest ROI (32.4%) with Garbine Muguruza and Kurumi Nara also seeing high win percentages and return on investments.

What is also interesting to see is how many players won as a heavy underdog. 22 out of the 25 players (88%) had wins priced over 3.00, whilst 18 (72%) had wins priced over 4.00 and 10 (40%) had wins priced over 5.00. Only Madison Keys, with a win over Na Li (priced 13.000), had a win when priced over 9.00.

Interestingly, higher ranked players were victims several times – Agnieszka Radwanska, Maria Sharapova, Ana Ivanovic, Caroline Wozniacki and Nadia Petrova all suffered this ignominy.

It may not be initially obvious but another statistic is vital. Only Annika Beck (ranked 49) had a negative return on investment from the 10 players inside the top 50 and this return was very small – just -4.5%.

Do rankings have an influence?

Therefore it is logical to assess whether ranking have an influence on the sample, and the tables below illustrate this: -

Top 50 Rank

Matches

P/L

ROI

534

6781

12.70

Rank 51-100

Matches

P/L

ROI

583

1747

3.00

Clearly the top ranked players performed best here, although this is logical as they’ve almost certainly had a rise in ranking in the past 12 months. Therefore it’s natural that their results will be strong. As previously mentioned, Halep’s results were superb, but overall backers of Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, Garbine Muguruza, Madison Keys, Bojana Jovanovski and Kurumi Nara in the past 12 months would have enjoyed double figure returns.

However, it’s certainly interesting to see that blindly backing young WTA players ranked between 51 and 100 did not have a horrific return on investment by any means, and with careful research there should be no reason why selective positive expectation betting opportunities could not exist amongst these players as well – certainly Monica Puig, Lauren Davis, Ajla Tomljanovic, Camila Giorgi and Dinah Pfizenmaier may be under-rated by the market currently.

Whilst the age of a player, particularly an underdog, may not be considered a viable option by many bettors, this article shows that it should be part of a tennis bettor’s pre-match research, along with many other factors.

Dan Weston is a freelance tennis writer who, along with producing expert content for Pinnacle Sports, also produces his own tennis rating system, and trading analysis, which can be found at www.tennisratings.co.uk.

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