This article is part of our Tennis Picks series.
Tennis at the 2024 Olympics in Paris continues Thursday. The women are one round ahead of the men, so Thursday's action will include the women's singles semifinals and men's singles quarterfinals. Unlike Grand Slams and Masters events, semifinal losers will have a chance at redemption in the bronze medal match, but the remaining competitors all have their sights set on going for gold. An underdog in the men's draw has an opportunity to turn around an unfavorable head-to-head against an opponent who has lost a step, while one of the best clay-court players in the history of women's tennis is set to continue her march towards another accolade on the surface.
All Tennis Odds & Lines are taken from DraftKings Sportsbook, but you can sometimes find more favorable odds on some of these matches by checking mobile sportsbooks such as FanDuel Sportsbook, BetMGM, Caesars Sportsbook, or any of the other best sports betting sites. We offer exclusive sign-up bonuses for some of those sportsbooks in states where sports betting has gone live.
All men's and women's singles matches at the Olympics are best of three sets. A mix of players' previous clay court results, recent form and stylistic matchups can help pinpoint intriguing betting opportunities, both among favorites likely to cruise to victory and underdogs ready to pull off upsets. The aforementioned underdogs are highlighted in the Upset Alert section, the Lock It In section covers players who can safely be viewed as overwhelming favorites, while the Value Bets section recommends enticing options in matchups that are considered closer to toss-ups.
Olympic Tennis Picks: Upset Alert
Stefanos Tsitsipas (+235) vs. Novak Djokovic
Djokovic has an overwhelming 11-2 edge in their head-to-head, but these two haven't met in 2024, and Djokovic has become less dominant at age 37 than he has been for the entirety of Tsitsipas' career up to this point. Three of their last four clay-court encounters have gone to a deciding set, including a 2021 match in Rome that Djokovic won 7-5 in the third and the 2021 French Open final, in which Tsitsipas won the first two sets. If the 25-year-old Tsitsipas can replicate his level from those two matches, it should be enough to pull out a win this time around. Tsitsipas has had the better clay-court results between these two in 2024, with a 22-5 record and a Masters 1000 title in Monte Carlo, while Djokovic is 13-3 on the surface this year and hasn't been past the semifinals of a clay-court event. Djokovic also hasn't been tested yet at the Olympics, facing three players ranked no higher than 70th, though one of them was a depleted but still dangerous Rafael Nadal.
Lorenzo Musetti (+180) vs. Alexander Zverev
This is an interesting stylistic matchup, as Musetti proved during his semifinal run at Wimbledon that he's adept at neutralizing big servers by reading their delivery well and using a short swing coupled with his exquisite hands to consistently make returns. If Musetti can limit the damage Zverev does on the first serve, it would create more opportunities for Zverev to tighten up on the second serve. Both players are able to step into their backhands and dictate play off that wing better than the vast majority of the tour, so this match could well come down to Zverev's forehand, which has looked good the past few months but has broken down in some key moments over the years. Musetti retired in their only previous match in 2022, but this version of the 22-year-old Italian is the best we have seen so far, anyway, and Musetti has outplayed his No. 16 ranking substantially of late. Like Djokovic, the fourth-ranked Zverev should still be viewed as a slight favorite, but both matches are much closer to toss-ups than the odds suggest.
Honorable Mention
Anna Karolina Schmiedlova (+160) vs. Donna Vekic
Olympic Tennis Odds: Lock It In
Carlos Alcaraz (-650) vs. Tommy Paul
Paul has played Alcaraz tough before, as Alcaraz has a narrow 3-2 head-to-head edge, but this will be their first clay-court meeting. Alcaraz has won 10 consecutive matches on clay, all at this venue, to improve his career win rate on this surface to .823, while Paul has a sub-.500 career record on the surface at 25-26 (.490). While the American has improved on clay, he'll have a hard time penetrating the speedy Alcaraz's defenses, while the Spaniard can finish points with both power and touch. Neither player has faced a top-25 opponent or dropped a set en route to the quarterfinals, but Alcaraz has a far more extensive track record of defeating top opponents on this surface.
Iga Swiatek (-1100) vs. Qinwen Zheng
Zheng has been clutch in this event, pulling out 6-5 (7), 7-6 (4), 6-1 and 6-7 (4), 6-4, 7-6 (6) wins over Emma Navarro and Angelique Kerber, respectively, in her last two matches to stretch her winning streak to nine matches. None of those wins came against players remotely in Swiatek's weight class on clay, though. Swiatek has gone 63-4 on clay since the start of 2022 and 25-1 on the surface this year, doing her best impression of her idol Nadal his prime and making her opponents look like the 2024 version of Nadal. The world No. 1 has lost only six sets on clay all year, so Zheng will have a hard time even keeping this match close. Despite being ranked seventh herself, Zheng has lost her last six matches against top-five opponents in straight sets. Those struggles against top players include a pair of losses to Swiatek this year, which brought Swiatek's overall head-to-head edge to 6-0, all since the 2022 French Open.
Olympic Tennis Predictions: Value Bets
Casper Ruud (-185) vs. Felix Auger-Aliassime
Auger-Aliassime just notched his first win over Daniil Medvedev after previously being 0-7 against the Russian. The surface served as an equalizer in that match, closing the gap between them after all of their previous encounters came on hard court. Playing on clay will have the opposite effect, here, though, as this is easily Ruud's best surface and far from FAA's favorite. Eleven of Ruud's 12 career titles have come on clay, and he's a two-time French Open finalist at this venue, while all five of Auger-Aliassime's career titles have come on hard courts, and the 19th-ranked Canadian's career clay-court win percentage is just .565, compared to marks over .600 on both hard and grass courts. Auger-Aliassime has been much better on clay in 2024 at 16-6, but even that mark pales in comparison to the ninth-ranked Ruuds' 24-6 clay-court record, which includes a semifinal finish at the French Open and two titles for the Norwegian. FAA got the better of Ruud on the high-altitude clay of Madrid this year, which is just about the most favorable clay-court venue for players who prefer faster courts, but Ruud leads their head-to-head 3-2 overall.
