{"id":106777,"date":"2026-06-15T23:55:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T03:55:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/?p=106777"},"modified":"2026-06-15T23:55:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T03:55:12","slug":"wta-nottingham-li-birrell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2026\/06\/15\/wta-nottingham-li-birrell\/","title":{"rendered":"WTA Nottingham First Round Best Bets Including Ann Li vs Kimberly Birrell"},"content":{"rendered":"

The WTA <\/span>Nottingham first-round<\/span><\/a> action continues on Tuesday. There has been a lot of news this week in terms of withdrawals on the WTA Tour. A lot of players are using caution <\/span>before Wimbledon<\/span><\/a>, making sure they are fully healthy two weeks from now instead of risking further injury now. A ton of withdrawals have affected the 500-point Berlin event, and the same is true in Nottingham. Emma Raducanu has withdrawn. So has Katie Boulter. Barbora Krejcikova has withdrawn as well, joining Iva Jovic, Jacqueline Cristian, and others. LWOS has our best bets for three matches. Post your best bets and thoughts in the comments.<\/span><\/p>\n

WTA Nottingham<\/b><\/h2>\n

Li \u2013 Birrell: Time 6:00 EST<\/b><\/h4>\n

H2H: 2-0<\/b><\/p>\n

Ann Li faces Kimberly Birrell. Li is ranked World No. 29, Birrell 73, yet Birrell is the clear betting-market favorite. She isn\u2019t a massive favorite, but a clear one. This match is not priced as a pure toss-up. Li is 2-2 in her last four matches, Birrell 1-3 in her last four. Why is Birrell the favorite? For one thing, she got some grass match play last week and is therefore likely more used to the surface than Li is. This will be Li\u2019s first match since Roland-Garros, so there are definitely worries about Li being rusty while Birrell is more in rhythm. Both players will try to develop some momentum before Wimbledon. This will be a good test for Li and Birrell.<\/span><\/p>\n

Best Bet to Make<\/b><\/p>\n

The fact that Li hasn\u2019t played since the French Open is not that big a deal. She basically took two weeks off, but during the second week of the French Open, players ranked in the top 30, as Li is, have no real incentive to play a smaller tournament. Li should be able to play her way into form in this match. Birrell has grass experience over the past week, playing three matches at two different tournaments, but she lost two of those three matches, so it\u2019s not as though she is an in-form player. Li is being priced as the moneyline underdog. There\u2019s tremendous value in taking her to win the match outright. Go for it.<\/span><\/p>\n

That being said, <\/span>betting on Li winning is a value bet for sure.<\/b><\/p>\n

Value bet\/ the best odds: Li winning @2.09 @Pinnacle<\/b><\/p>\n

Kessler \u2013 Volynets: Time 6:30 EST<\/b><\/h4>\n

H2H: 1\u20130<\/b><\/p>\n

McCartney Kessler faces Katie Volynets. Kessler is the much higher-ranked player, placed inside the top 50, while Volynets is just outside the top 100. However, Volynets has had a better grass season thus far, going 4-1 in five matches and winning two qualifying matches in Nottingham to make the main draw here. Kessler lost her only grass match last week, but she lost to Karolina Pliskova, a former Wimbledon finalist. That\u2019s not a bad loss, but it still prevented Kessler from getting more match play last week. Volynets has gained plenty of match play in the early stages of grass season, so she will count on that to help her in this match.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Best Bet to Make<\/b><\/p>\n

The lack of grass match play for Kessler compared to Volynets is worth noting. Kessler might be the higher-ranked player in this matchup, but she hasn\u2019t been playing great tennis. So, even though Kessler is the clear betting-market favorite, she doesn\u2019t stand out as the player more likely to win this match. This feels like a toss-up, which means you could go with Volynets moneyline, since she is getting an underdog\u2019s price instead of a pick-\u2019em price. However, we are simply going to go with over 2.5 sets, since we can\u2019t clearly make up our minds on the match winner and think this battle will be very close.<\/span><\/p>\n

That being said, <\/span>betting on over 2.5 sets is a value bet for sure.<\/b><\/p>\n

Value bet\/ the best odds: over 2.5 sets @2.50 @WilliamHill<\/b><\/p>\n

McNally \u2013 Ruzic: Time 7:30 EST<\/b><\/h4>\n

H2H: 0-0<\/b><\/p>\n

Caty McNally faces Antonia Ruzic. These players are very close in the world rankings. McNally is No. 54, Ruzic No. 57. McNally is 2-1 in three grass matches over the past week, while Ruzic is 4-1. McNally\u2019s one grass loss was to Ajla Tomljanovic. Ruzic\u2019s loss was to Iva Jovic. Both players have a clear goal of getting into the top 50 and improving their position so they can regularly get into important tournaments. There is plenty for both players to play for. They should be highly motivated to win here and begin what they hope will be a very productive week in Nottingham.<\/span><\/p>\n

Best Bet to Make<\/b><\/p>\n

Over 2.5 sets is a really good bet to make here, but we\u2019re going to go in a different direction. As noted above, the two players are very close to each other in the WTA world rankings, separated by only three spots. Yet, McNally is a very solid betting-market moneyline favorite. Ruzic has already won four grass matches this month, so she is comfortable on the surface and is displaying good form. A bet on Ruzic is the way to go. You could go with game spread or maybe even moneyline, but we feel comfortable with Ruzic plus 1.5 sets, thinking it\u2019s highly likely that she will win at least one set. The price is reasonable.<\/span><\/p>\n

That being said, <\/span>betting on Ruzic +1.5 sets is a value bet for sure.<\/b><\/p>\n

Value bet\/ the best odds: Ruzic +1.5 sets @1.72 @Unibet<\/b><\/p>\n

Main Photo Credit: Eric Bolte-USA TODAY Sports\u00a0 <\/span><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The WTA Nottingham first-round action continues on Tuesday. There has been a lot of news this week in terms of withdrawals on the WTA Tour. A lot of players are using caution before Wimbledon, making sure they are fully healthy two weeks from now instead of risking further injury now. A ton of withdrawals have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5481,"featured_media":88321,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17400,4],"tags":[43850,10120,42444,17399,3245,8293,4109,41787,1207],"class_list":["post-106777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-best-bets","category-wta","tag-2026-wta-nottingham","tag-ann-li","tag-antonia-ruzic","tag-best-bets","tag-caty-mcnally","tag-katie-volynets","tag-kimberly-birrell","tag-mccartney-kessler","tag-wta-nottingham"],"modified_by":"Kane Webb","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5481"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106777"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106777\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":106778,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106777\/revisions\/106778"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}