Jelena Ostapenko - Clara Tauson predictions and free betting tips [29/05/2024]

Hello everyone! The Roland Garros moves to the 1/32 finals. In the women's bracket, there are plenty of intriguing matches for both viewing pleasure and great betting opportunities. Jelena Ostapenko will face Clara Tauson in what promises to be an eventful clash. The Latvian tennis player is the favourite, but many will likely contest this claim.

Jelena Ostapenko

Ostapenko often unleashes a flurry of emotions on everyone, but when the Latvian player is composed, she is capable of winning trophies.

Interestingly, Jelena is not particularly fond of clay, though her first WTA title came at the 2017 Roland Garros. Since then, Ostapenko hasn't found much success on this surface. In contrast, she performs well on other courts, especially on the indoor hardcourt version, where the balls have a softer bounce, perfectly suiting her aggressive playing style.

This season, Ostapenko has clinched two titles: an indoor trophy in Linz and another on the standard hard court in Adelaide. Jelena has been in good form, showing a decent performance at the clay-court Masters in Rome, where she only lost to Aryna Sabalenka in the quarterfinals after beating three tough opponents. In Paris, the Latvian had an average match against Jacqueline Cristian, who could have won both sets but lacked something. The second set was particularly chaotic, with both players taking turns leading the game. Ostapenko missed a match point but eventually regrouped and triumphed on experience.

A match with Tauson should feature powerful tennis, with many 'unforced errors' from Ostapenko, who also tends to produce a good number of 'winners'. However, against Clara, she needs to play more reliably than she did in the first round.

Clara Tauson

The Dane is impressive, though she still needs to improve to show good results in 'main' tournaments rather than just playing in the ITF tour, where Tauson has already won 11 titles. Nonetheless, Clara also boasts three notable titles from 2021, indicating that she can aim for more than a few seasonal Futures wins.

This year, Tauson has yet to achieve significant success. She managed to reach the final of the clay-court ITF tournament in Oeiras (2). There were smaller achievements for her ranking, such as after recovering from an injury sustained in the Madrid Masters qualifiers. The Dane performed admirably at the Rome Masters, where she navigated through the qualifiers and won one main draw match before falling in the second round to Anna Kalinskaya. Additionally, at the Billie Jean King Cup, Clara had five excellent matches, winning all of them in straight sets despite facing varied and sometimes tough opponents.

In Roland Garros, Clara started with a confident performance against Tatjana Maria, where many things went well for Tauson. However, the German was not powerful enough to test Clara's readiness for a clay-court Grand Slam.

In the second round, Tauson will face Ostapenko, whose tennis is often uncomfortable, especially on clay or other 'soft' courts. When Jelena goes on the attack and uses her quick footwork, powerful cross-court shots, and strong first serve, Clara will have to respond in kind. But Tauson has strong strokes from both her backhand and forehand and a good serve herself.

Head-to-head

Both players are skilled on 'indoor' courts, having met there and won one match each. Notably, one of these meetings was in Linz this year, where Ostapenko secured a 9-7 victory in the tie-break of the deciding set.

Prediction: Jelena Ostapenko vs Clara Tauson

Place a bet on TO 21.5 games. We might see two sets, or the ladies could once again play a deciding set.