French Open champ Wawrinka begins Queen’s quest with Kyrgios clash

The road to Wimbledon and tennis season always goes through the AEGON Championships at Queen’s Club across London in West Kensington.

Home hope Andy Murray is Coral’s 6/4 favourite to lay down a marker ahead of the grass Grand Slam in SW19 by winning this ATP warm-up tournament following his best-ever clay court campaign.

Scottish star Murray is one of six former champions set to compete at Queen’s; a list headed by Rafael Nadal (5/1), yet French Open winner Stan Wawrinka (13/2) will be looking to build on his Roland Garros glory after upsetting world number one Novak Djokovic there.

Now ranked just two spots behind fellow Switzerland star and all-time great Roger Federer in the ATP world rankings, number four Wawrinka faces a tough opening assignment in London, as he is paired with Australia’s Nick Kyrgios for the first time.

Made a narrow 8/15 favourite for victory, second seed Wawrinka will be wary of Kyrgios (11/8 to upset the Swiss)

Grigor Dimitrov, the reigning champion at Queen’s, begins his defence (12/1 chance) by facing another former victor Sam Querrey. A surprise winner five years ago, the American is a 5/2 outsider to shock Bulgaria’s best player, ranked one place below Nadal in 11th in the ATP world rankings and seeded sixth.

Deadly Dimitrov, who would face Murray in the quarter-finals if the draw pans out as expected, dominated his only previous clash with Querrey, winning in Washington DC in straight sets two years ago.

Punters can enhance Dimitrov’s odds-on match status from 2/7 to 4/5 if you back the Bulgarian to crush Querrey without dropping a set again.

Veteran Aussie and 2002 Wimbledon champion Lleyton Hewitt is a four-time winner of Queen’s, including back-to-back final victories over Tim Henman. The 34-year-old faces top 20 player Kevin Anderson, and this pair have one win apiece in their head-to-head record.

Hewitt is a 7/4 shot to go to the well one more time and hand defeat to Anderson again, though lost his most recent meeting with the South African at Indian Wells last year. It’s odds-on at 2/5 that Anderson sends Hewitt home.

Nadal and fourth seed Marin Cilic are both strong favourites at 1/4 and 1/3 respectively to come through their opening contests with Alexandr Dolgopolov and Adrian Mannarino.

Coral betting tip: Take that superb 7/4 on Hewitt to roll back the years and beat Anderson at Queen’s.