Andy Schooler has four underdogs to back in this week’s Monday tennis tips, looking at the first round matches in both Eastbourne and Mallorca. Read his expert insight below.
Top Tennis Tips: Andy Schooler’s Round 1 Advice
Top Tennis Tips: Zizou Bergs v Joao Fonseca (Mon)
Fonseca is being priced up on his claycourt ability here but this is the grasscourt season and Bergs has to be the value bet. The Belgian made the final in Den Bosch just over a week ago where he beat both Alexei Popyrin and Reilly Opelka and should be pretty confident coming in here.
Fonseca, on the other hand, is still finding his way on this surface. The Brazilian has won only two of his seven career matches on grass and neither victory was against a top-100 player. Bergs, the world number 57, can win this as an outsider.
Top Tennis Tips: Dan Evans v Miomir Kecmanovic (Mon)
I was impressed by Evans at Queen’s Club last week where he took seed Frances Tiafoe apart. His grasscourt nous proved too much for the American with Evans’ excellent slice again paying rich dividends for him. The Briton should be motivated on home soil and I’d expect him to handle the windy conditions, which often occur at Eastbourne and are forecast for Monday, the better.
While Evans was beating Tiafoe, Kecmanovic played over in Halle and lost in the first round to Fabian Marozsan, his fifth defeat in six matches. At main-tour level, the Serb has won only three of 13 since claiming the Delray Beach title in February. He looks a vulnerable favourite to me.
Top Tennis Tips: Learner Tien v Justin Engel (Mon)
These two are both newcomers to the surface in 2025 but there’s no doubt who has settled in the better. 17-year-old Engel impressed on home soil in Stuttgart where he beat Alex Michelsen and James Duckworth to make the quarter-finals. The big eyecatcher was his serve and he arrives here having held onto it in 91% of his service games across his five grasscourt matches.
Admittedly, his return game has been a struggle with only 9% of return games won but even that looks good when compared with Tien’s paltry figure of 3%. He’s really struggled on return on this surface, failing to create a single break point in his last two matches on it. OK, Nicolas Jarry and Brandon Nakashima are both decent servers but then, from what we’ve seen so far, so is Engel.
This will be only Tien’s fourth match on grass, his one win coming via a retirement, and the surface only appears to be adding to his recent struggles. Following his impressive start to the season Down Under, the young American has gone 4-12 since February, his best win via ranking in that period being against the world number 78. Engel isn’t ranked highly yet but he does look to be going places and can win this at odds-against.
Top Tennis Tips: Benjamin Bonzi v Brandon Holt (Tue)
For our biggest-priced pick of the week, let’s go with Holt, who qualified well over the weekend in Mallorca. He’s got a big first serve which should win him plenty of cheap points in the searing heat expected at Santa Ponsa – just round corner from Magaluf – this week. It landed Holt 84% of the points played on it across those two qualifiers as he captured the form that took him to the semis of the Birmingham Challenger event on grass earlier this month.
Technically, the level of opposition rises here but the fact is Bonzi hasn’t won a tour-level match on grass since 2022, losing his last five such encounters. I’m not suggesting Holt should be the favourite here but I don’t believe he’s a genuine 2.62 chance.
Top Tennis Tips: R1 Best Bets, June 23rd 2025
Bergs to beat Fonseca @ 2.3 with kwiff
Evans to beat Kecmanovic @ 2.2 with kwiff
Engel to beat Tien @ 2.15 with kwiff
Holt to beat Bonzi @ 2.62 with kwiff
By Andy Schooler
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