The third round of the men’s singles at the 2017 Australian Open begins on Friday, with eight matches from the top half of the draw scheduled for today.

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We came away from day four with a slight profit after headline pick Pablo Carreno Busta was an odds-against winner in straight sets over Kyle Edmund.

We didn’t get a result with Gilles Muller though, as Milos Raonic was too good on the day and we move on to day five, which could be a difficult one for the players if the forecast is correct.

We’re set for 33mph winds and rain showers on Friday, so it could be a test for all concerned and the roof(s) will probably be in play if the forecast is right.

Bernard Tomic vs Daniel Evans

Britain’s Evans will fancy this after a superb start to the season that’s seen him make a first main level final and knock a major champion out of a Slam in the opening weeks.

And the stats say he has a fine chance, with Evans’ recent success boosting his service hold/break stats over the last year on outdoor hard at main level to an impressive total of 104.9 (79.8% holds/25.1% breaks).

Those numbers are better than Tomic’s, with the Aussie recording a total of 100.5 (82.4% holds/18.1% breaks) in the same time frame.

The match-up should be a favourable one for Evans too, with the cat and mouse style of Tomic seeing the Aussie struggle against the Brit in the past.

Evans stunned Tomic at the US Open of 2013 in a four set win and even when Evans was down at 300 in the world it took Tomic four sets (two of them breakers) to see off the Brit in Davis Cup indoors in 2015.

I didn’t fancy Evans’ chances that much against the more powerful game of Marin Cilic in round two, but the Croat was poor and later stated that the end of 2016 “left a mark on me” and that he hasn’t been able to lift himself for this season yet.

That match started the way I expected, with Cilic’s power hurting Evans, but the former US Open champ couldn’t keep it up and it was a fine performance in the end combined with a poor one from Cilic that saw the Brit home.

We’ll see an awful lot of cagier rallies on Friday, with slices aplenty, and with Tomic looking rather unfit and ineffective in a three-hour 20 minute struggle against Victor Estrella Burgos there’s a big chance for Evans here as betting underdog.

Steve Darcis vs Andreas Seppi

Injury-prone Belgian Darcis has proven a bit of a thorn in my side this season, getting thumped by Albert Ramos 6-2, 6-0 in Chennai and beating Diego Schwartzman here, but he has to be taken on today at these prices.

That win over Schwartzman was the first time Darcis had beaten an opponent better ranked than 146 at the Australian Open and this is only his second time into the last-32 in a major.

The only other occasion was on clay at the French Open in 2011 and his weak serve surely can’t take him much further in a major played on a quick hard court.

Seppi has a big advantage on serve and has hit 50 aces already this week (Darcis has hit eight) and the Belgian has won only 68.1% of his first serve points over his last 50 matches on outdoor hard at main level.

The Italian is better in that department at 73.2% and even after a five setter against Nick Kyrgios in the last round I’d expect Seppi to have enough in the tank to go again and defeat Darcis with something to spare.

That Kyrgios match was quick for a five setter at just over three hours (as you’d expect with NK’s rapid playing style) and in any case Seppi hadn’t played since October last year, so he’s hardly running on empty.

In the 2015 Australian Open Seppi beat Denis Istomin in round one in five sets before defeating Jeremy Chardy in four, Roger Federer in four and then lost 8-6 in the fifth to Kyrgios, so fatigue doesn’t worry me and those results show how conditions here suit Seppi’s game..

The service hold/break profile of the pair of them hints at few tie breaks, with quite low service holds and over their last 10 matches each on outdoor hard at main level their tie breaks per set ratios are 0.09 and 0.14.

Giving Seppi the edge then I’ll side with -2.5 games at 1.83 here.

The big match of the day for many will be Roger Federer vs Tomas Berdych, but it looks one to avoid to me from a betting perspective, with Federer’s current level pretty much guesswork.

Understandably, the Swiss has looked rusty in his opening matches here, but would you trust Berdych to beat him at a price like 2.35 – his shortest ever price against Federer?

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga should just have the edge on Jack Sock, but that one looks to be priced up about right, so I don’t see any value on the Frenchman, while Andy Murray, Stan Wawrinka and Kei Nishikori should all win fairly comfortably – there again, you’d have thought Novak Djokovic would beat Denis Istomin.

The only other one that I was tempted by was to side with the extra energy of Malek Jaziri against Mischa Zverev, with the latter having played a four-hour plus five setter in the previous round.

Zverev has a bad injury record, with 34 retirements or walkovers in his career, and he lost his previous two matches against Jaziri, so despite better stats I wouldn’t trust him at 1.55.

Best Bets
1 point win Evans to beat Tomic at $2.04
1 point win Seppi -2.5 games to beat Darcis at $1.83