Rogers Cup 2014 Betting: Gasquet can start strongly against Murray in Toronto

The Gasquet backhand can cause problems for Murray today

The Rogers Cup reaches its last-16 stage on Thursday and after another two winners yesterday, Sean Calvert is back with two more bets for today in Toronto...

Wednesday's bets began in good style when Jeremy Chardy made hard work of it, but managed to cover the handicap in a pretty mediocre match with compatriot Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

It's a match that Chardy should have won considering he had two set points at *6-4 in the first set tie break, but he fluffed them both with lax forehands and then double faulted to hand the set to Tsonga.

At that point I feared a second set collapse, but Chardy did enough to take the +3.5 game handicap in the end.

Later on, the night owls were rewarded when Yen Hsun Lu covered the handicap pretty comfortably against Tomas Berdych in a three set loss and those on +5.5 or +4.5, or even +3.5 would have collected on that one.

I didn't fare quite so well on my Andy Murray effort, but his unpredictability makes him a nightmare to bet on generally - and even more so when he's been off court for a while.

Nick Kyrgios was simply outclassed, but wouldn't it be just like Andy to back that up with a real struggle against Richard Gasquet today?

The Gasman made the final the last time this event was held in Toronto and he does have a tendency to start out strongly against Murray before generally fading.

Gasquet won the first set against Murray in four of their last six meetings and the other two he lost in tie breaks, so the Brit often has problems with the Frenchman early.

The price of 3.02/1 about set one to Gasquet looks the bet here, with Dickie likely to fade later on after a tough battle with Ivo Karlovic yesterday.

The other bet I like today is for Berdych and Feli Lopez to go long in their opening set and the 7-6 to Berdych is 5.69/2, while the same score for Lopez is a 7.5n/a shot.

Feli has been serving well this week and that's largely what got him through against Tim Smyczek last night and Berdych does struggle against Lopez generally.

Lopez holds a 5-4 career lead over the Czech and beat him on his favourite grass this summer at Queen's.

On hard I would fancy Tomas to get a bit of revenge and the 7-6 to him appeals to me today at a big price that should lead to a good Cash Out opportunity.

Elsewhere, it's hard to make much of a case for many underdogs today and it looks a day to just try a couple of bigger priced shots and wait for better value match betting opportunities to come.

Recommended Bet
Back Gasquet to win set one at 3.02/1

Best Cash Out Opportunity
Back Berdych to win set one 7-6 at 5.69/2

Rogers Cup 2014 profit and loss

Staked: 60.00 (based on a 10 stake per bet)
Returned: 70.80
Profit: + 10.80