Andy Schooler previews Monday’s Cincinnati Open blockbuster final between Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz.
Tennis betting tips: Cincinnati Open final
1pt Jannik Sinner to beat Carlos Alcaraz 2-1 at 3/1 (General)
Jannik Sinner v Carlos Alcaraz (Monday, 2000 BST)
The Cincinnati Open was the fourth tournament both of these players have contested in 2025 and at all four, the duo have reached the final.
They are the world’s top two by some distance and fans can look forward to another cracking contest.
Alcaraz leads the tour-level head-to-head 8-5 but his run of five successive wins ended when the pair last met – five weeks ago at Wimbledon. It should have ended at Roland Garros but Sinner blew three championship points in that French Open meeting.
Both have an incredibly high level and also tend to bring out the best in each other.
But, for me, Sinner is the more consistent player and I feel that’s been borne out over the past week or so.
He’s not dropped a set en route to the final, although it’s also fair to say his route through has been fairly easy, certainly by Masters 1000 standards. His highest-ranked opponent has been Felix Auger-Aliassime, the world number 28, and he barely showed up.
Alcaraz lost sets to Damir Dzumhur and Andrey Rublev – the latter match was something of a struggle – before taking down our 22/1 outright pick Alex Zverev, who was frustratingly unable to truly compete due to illness.
We’ve quite often seen the Spaniard below his best level in the past couple of seasons but he does usually manage to find a way to win. That obviously becomes harder against the best there is – a patchy performance just won’t cut it on Monday.
The tournament numbers also help show how Sinner has looked the better player thus far. He’s ahead in terms of first serve points won (89%-76%), second-serve points won (63%-53%), service holds (93%-85%) and service breaks (39%-36%).
It is this greater consistency aspect which makes me agree with the bookies, who make Sinner an 8/13 favourite.
That’s a bit short to be putting up on these pages though and so it’s worth looking at how the Italian may win the match.
Previous meetings certainly suggest he won’t run away with it.
Tie-breaks have been a regular feature – 10 of the 13 tour-level meetings have seen one, although the Wimbledon final didn’t. You can get 11/10 about a breaker on Monday.
Sinner has played one in three of the last four rounds with the quick conditions making it harder for him to dominate on return. Alcaraz is yet to play one though and he’s not been at his best on serve this week.
Both players to win a set has landed in nine of those 13 matches, as well as their clash at the 6 Kings exhibition event last autumn, a match which was taken very seriously with a huge prize fund up for grabs.
Over 2.5 sets is offered at 5/4. Tempting.
However, if you fancy this pattern to continue and, like me, feel Sinner will ultimately prevail, it might be worth taking the 3/1 about Sinner winning in three sets.
This looks a good way of bumping the price up and takes into account that variance of level that we’ve seen from Alcaraz.
Posted at 1645 BST on 17/08/25
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