ad the lights not shut off and disrupted Camila Osorio Serrano as she served one of her several match points to Leylah Fernandez, she’d probably have captured her first WTA hardcourt title Sunday night in Monterrey. The prediction that Fernandez would race to a first-set lead came true, but Fernandez was unable to close out the first set, in large part due to Osorio Serrano’s incredible gifts on the court.
When a player does something like this, it instills a deep fear that your best might not be good enough.
At this point in her career the Colombian is definitely a slow starter, but it’s almost like she needs the pressure of being a break down to really kickstart her competitive energy and find her best level. She was down a break in the first set of every single Monterrey match, but only ended up losing the first to an inspired Elina Svitolina.
Things could change, but right now, we should try and take advantage of her slow starts. As long as the Colombian is healthy, and you see that competitive fire on-court, she is absolutely worth a live bet when down a break, or even a set. If your WTA Monterrey betting plan was to live-bet Osorio every time she got down a break, you could be flying first-class to Indian Wells and staying at the Renaissance this week.
Osorio is both deceptively fast, and insanely fast at the same time. She doesn’t look like the best athlete out there, but you can’t argue with the tape. Her defensive skills are Top 10 material.
When Osorio NEEDS to win a point, she will slice her backhand a lot. As a natural counterpuncher, she wants to force her opponent to make the first decision. Osorio’s slice is a bit different than most. It reminds me a lot of Bianca Andreescu’s. It’s probably more effective on a clay court, or gritty hard court than a fast one. Her slice doesn’t skim the net cord like slice-god Ash Barty’s, but Osorio’s slice has a lot of check and sidespin, making it hard for her opponents to get a clean hit on it.
She also uses it to bait opponents to the net.
Moving forward, I will be monitoring the Colombian’s matches closely. If she enters the match as a favorite and finds herself down a break, I will absolutely live-bet her match spread, and consider betting her to win whichever set she’s trailing. Assuming she is healthy, she should wreak havoc on the Indian Wells hardcourts, which play as slow as many clay courts, if not slower. The live-bet algorithms have no choice but to adjust when a player is down a break, but that might be right where Osorio wants them.
