Ricky Dimon
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With the Paris Olympics tennis event being played on Iga Swiatek’s stomping grounds of Roland Garros, the women’s singles gold medal never seemed to be in much doubt. That was until Thursday, when Qinwen Zheng stunned the world #1 and 4-time French Open champion. Two days later, it will be Zheng going up against Donna Vekic for gold in a surprising final.
Let’s take a look at the best bets to me made on the women’s gold-medal match.
Donna Vekic +3.5 games over Qinwen Zheng (-110)
It may be a bit of a stretch to call this “the summer of Donna Vekic,” but at the same time it wouldn’t be entirely out of bounds. The 28-year-old has simply been awesome over the past month. She finished runner-up in Bad Homburg, made a run to the Wimbledon semis and now finds herself in the gold-medal match. Zheng is the favorite given her higher ranking and history of clay-court success, but it’s not like she is unbeatable. To say that Vekic would rather face Zheng than Swiatek would be the understatement of the century. The 21-year-old from China did not fare well under the pressure of the Australian Open final earlier this season, when he lost to Aryna Sabalenka 6-3, 6-2. Getting 3.5 games should be more than enough. In fact, Vekic has great chance to win this outright; I would back her at +195 on the money line.
Qinwen Zheng vs. Donna Vekic Over 21.5 games (-120)
Also encouraging for Vekic is her 2 previous meetings with Zheng. The Croat prevailed in straight sets at a 2021 event in Courmayeur (the first set went to a tiebreaker) before losing a 6-4, 6-7(6), 6-4 thriller at the 2023 Zhuhai tournament. This has all the makings of an extremely competitive contest. It’s also worth noting that neither woman has ever won a Grand Slam and obviously neither has ever won Olympic gold. This is the biggest match of Vekic’s career and arguably the second biggest of Zheng’s professional life following the Aussie Open title tilt. It’s hard to see either one withstanding the pressure and closing it out in routine fashion. Expect a long, back-and-forth affair.
Donna Vekic Over 2.5 service breaks (-163)
Vekic is break serve at incredible rate in Paris. She has broken opponents a whopping 27 times through 5 matches for an average of 5.4. The world #21 has played only 11 total set (she lost just 1 to Marta Kostyuk in the quarterfinals), so that equates to 2.45 breaks per set. In other worlds, Vekic can be expected to soar over this number even if Saturday’s contest is a straight-setter. She has broken Zheng a more modest 5 times in 2 head-to-head encounters, but note that she generated 16 total break points in those 2 matches.
