Wimbledon Betting Tips: British teen can push 2024 champion hard on Day 1

Day 1 of Wimbledon and I've got three selections from the ladies' singles first round for your perusal.

My Wimbledon Betting Tips for the first day follow, featuring a former champion...

Match Betting - Zeynep Sonmez to beat Ann Li @ 8/11

Turkish No. 1 and World No. 54 Zeynep Sonmez has enjoyed a positive grass swing so far, winning nine of her 12 matches (including one walkover), notably making the quarter-finals in ‘s-Hertogenbosch and Eastbourne.

Last year, she breezed through the first couple of rounds at Wimbledon, beating both Jaqueline Cristian and Xinyu Wang in straight sets before losing to 18th seed Ekaterina Alexandrova in the third round.

While the 24-year-old appears to be comfortable on grass now, the same cannot be said for American No. 6 and World No. 29 Ann Li, who has lost five of her last eight matches on the surface, including two of her four this season.

Li overcame Australians Kimberly Birrell and Taylah Preston, both in straight sets, in the first and second round, respectively, of the Nottingham Open before losing in three sets to Viktorija Golubic in the third and exiting in the opening round at Bad Homburg to Alexandrova.

The 26-year-old beat Golubic 2-1 in the opening round of Wimbledon last year but fell at the second hurdle in three sets to Elise Mertens.

Li and Sonmez have met twice before, both times at the Merida Open in Mexico, with the Turk easing to a 6-2, 6-1 success in 2024 before scraping past her opponent 3-6, 7-6, 6-4 in February this year.

With four wins (including one walkover) from her last five, Sonmez is carrying plenty of confidence into this contest, and against an opponent she has never lost to, albeit both previous meetings came on hard courts, I’m expecting her to make the second round of Wimbledon again this year.

Set Betting - Tatjana Maria 2-0 vs Yulia Putintseva @ 21/20

Tatjana Maria, who won her second and most recent grass-court title at Queen’s Club last year, wasn’t awarded a wildcard to this year’s event and was forced to come through two rounds of qualifying just to reach the main draw.

After qualifying, the 38-year-old beat Maria Sakkari 6-3, 6-3 in the first round before losing 7-6, 5-7, 0-6 to World No. 2 and 2022 Wimbledon champion Elena Rybakina.

The German No. 4 and World No. 112 subsequently reached the third round in Nottingham before going to Eastbourne and finaling, losing 5-7, 4-6 to World No. 27 and 2025 Australian Open champion Madison Keys.

Maria has won 10 of her 14 grass-court contests this calendar year, all played in England, so she’ll be carrying plenty of confidence into this match with Yulian Putintseva, who lost her only meeting on this surface this season 1-6, 3-6 to World No. 246 Alicia Dudeney in the Nottingham Open qualifiers on 13 June.

Putintseva has lost her last four matches on grass dating back to last year’s Nottingham Open, failing to win a set in the last three, and her last-16 run at Wimbledon in 2024 feels like a long time ago now, with just one win from her last seven on the surface.

Wimbledon Odds

Game Handicap 2 - Hannah Klugman +4.5 vs Barbora Krejcikova @ 2/1

Hannah Klugman may be a modest 416 in the WTA rankings, but she only turned 17 in February and is a former junior World No. 1 having finished runner-up at
Roland Garros, made the semi-finals at the US Open and quarter-final of Wimbledon (all junior events) last year.

She was handed a wildcard for the Wimbledon main draw this year and paired with two-time Grand Slam champion Barbora Krejcikova, who won Wimbledon in 2024.

Krejcikova, then, has a fondness for the grass, but she was knocked out in the third round of Wimbledon last year by Emma Navarro, so she's got something to prove this time around.

The World No. 37 won her first four matches on the surface this year, making the final in 's-Hertogenbosch before withdrawing due to illness. Nine days later, she was back in action in Eastbourne, but was beaten 3-6, 6-7 by Birrell in the first round.

Klugman was also beaten in the first round of the same event, losing 5-7, 7-5, 5-7 to Tereza Valentova, but as you can see from the scoreline, it was a competitive affair, with the Brit easily covering the +4.5 game handicap.

Krejcikova will be Klugman's third consecutive opponent from the Czech Republic, with the teenager losing 5-7, 2-6 to Czech No. 3 and World No. 23 Marie Bouzkova in Nottingham prior to her defeat to Valentova.

She's been competitive in defeat to her previous two Czech opponents, and if she serves well on Monday, as she can can, there's no reason to think she can't keep in touch with Krejcikova to cover the +4.5 game handicap.