Talented Max Marterer can shine in his homeland

Start Monday

ATP German Open
French Open finalist Dominic Thiem tops the bill in Hamburg this week and if the Austrian is in the mood, there could be only one winner.

Diego Schwartzman, Pablo Carreno Busta, Richard Gasquet and Fernando Verdasco look the seeds who could threaten the Austrian most – Umag finalist Marco Cecchinato had a busy time last week and can be passed over at the Rothenbaum Club.

Two-time champion Leonardo Mayer will be taking his title defence seriously but in the search for title value, the hugely promis­ing Max Marterer merits respect in his homeland.

Thiem may have to be on his guard to get past Jan-Lennard Struff, who has stepped up his game well in recent years and merits a decent title of his own.

Recommendations
M Marterer
1pt 50-1 Betfair, Paddy Power
J-L Struff
1pt 40-1 general

ATP Swiss Open
It's the men's turn in the Alps this week and outright punters face a difficult time trying to find the winner of this year's gathering in Gstaad.

Fabio Fognini, champion in Bastad on Sunday, defends his Swiss Open title but the Italian may not be giving his absolute all after a busy week in Sweden.

Feliciano Lopez won this event two years ago so the Spaniard may also be going through the motions in the mountains and we could see a trio of seeds – Roberto Bautista Agut, Borna Coric and Robin Haase – fighting it out in the bottom half of the draw for a place in the final.

Spanish duo Guillermo Garcia-Lopez – the other seed in the lower section – and Roberto Carballes Baena could not be ruled out either.
With Guido Pella having reached the Umag final, there's a chance for his fellow Argentinian Federico Delbonis to strut his stuff.

Classy youngster Andrey Rublev went well on his return from injury last week, but it's surely asking too much of Nicolas Almagro to add to his 2010 Gstaad triumph.

Recommendation
F Delbonis
1pt 14-1 Coral, Ladbrokes

ATP Atlanta Open
John Isner is enjoying his annus mirabilis in the autumn of his career and the American beanpole has a fine chance of making it five wins in Atlanta in six years.

He chose to rest instead of going to Newport last week and that should help his cause. The presence of Nick Kyrgios is always alarming for punters given the Aussie’s potential, but it's anyone's guess what his mindset is right now.

As well as a bet on Isner, punters can also have an each-way interest on Taylor Fritz.

The Californian returned from his Wimbledon trip to play a blinder for his World Team Tennis side San Diego and if Kyrgios is not fully focused in the opening week of the US Open Series, Fritz could capitalise.

Recommendations
J Isner
1pt 3-1 Betfred, Paddy Power
T Fritz
1pt each-way 22-1 Paddy Power

WTA Jiangxi Open
It's going to be devilishly hot in Jiangxi – the forecast is for high temperatures of 38C – and fitness could well play a part in deciding this year's winner of the Chinese event.

This is not a 125K Series – it’s a proper International category tournament – and so it's fair to assume the homeland big guns will be to the fore.

It would be no surprise to see the top two seeds Shuai Zhang and Qiang Wang battling it out on the final day.

Zhang will have to be on top of her game from the outset with an opener against 2013 Wimbledon finalist Sabine Lisicki and a possible last-16 clash against Margarita Gasparyan, so it could pay to chance Wang this year.

Recommendation
Qiang Wang
1pt 7-2 bet365

WTA Moscow River Cup
There's a brand new International-class tournament in the calendar on outdoor clay in Moscow with plenty of prize money up for grabs.

Wimbledon semi-finalist Julia Goerges, who loves playing on clay, tops the bill and the homeland charge is led by second seed Daria Kasatkina.

Fellow seeds Alize Cornet, champion in Gstaad on Sunday, and Bucharest heroine Anastasija Sevastova were busy last week so make less appeal, while Aliak­sandra Sasnovich is improving nicely although clay may not be her best surface.

A number of the Russians have chances of posting deep tournament runs, but Kasatkina could be the one they all have to beat and punters can consider siding with the second seed when bookmakers issue outright quotes.

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