The Australian Open is Australia's main tennis tournament and forms part of the Grand Slam competition which also
includes the Wimbledon Championships, the United States Open and the French Open. The first tennis tournament to
be held in Australia was at Melbourne's Warehouseman's Cricket Ground in 1905. The venue shifted around Australia over the years before it was decided in 1972 that the event should always be held in Melbourne. The popularity of the event has grown over the years and now attracts over 60,000 spectators on popular match days.

The Australian Open, the first of the world's four Grand Slam tennis tournaments during the year, is scheduled to open at Melbourne Park on January 19, 2009. 
 
The Australian Open reaches its climax on February 1 with the men's singles championship match. The women's singles final is held on January 31. All these dates are subject to confirmation
closer to the event.

Previous tournament's winners; Novak Djokovic won the men's Australian Open and Maria Sharapova won the women's Australian Open in 2008. It was the third time each player had won the title.

Mens Australian Open Betting

Today Australian Open tennis betting odds keep growing as the youngest of the grand slam tournaments raises its greatness with every passing year. It is the first of the world's four major tournaments which together constitute the Grand Slam. It now occurs during the last two weeks of January but was formerly held in December. Held in the middle of the Australian summer, the Australian Open is famous for its notoriously hot days. An extreme-heat policy is often put into play when temperatures (and humidity) reach dangerous levels.

The Australian Open started in 1905, which means that it is a few years younger than the French Open (1891),
Wimbledon (1877) and US Open (1881), but now it gets much more attention than it did before the tennis competition moved to Melbourne Park in 1988.

Traditionally, accomplishing a slam is to win all four majors in a calendar year; recently tennis fans have adopted the shorthand of referring to each of the four parts of the Slam (Australian, French, Wimbledon and US Opens) as a slam in itself. The Australian Rod Laver was the last man to complete a Grand Slam in men's singles in 1969. On the women's side, Steffi Graf was the last woman to win a Grand Slam in 1988, and she also won the Olympic Gold in Seoul in the same year, making it a Golden Slam.

Australian Open 2009 promised to continue that Grand Slam tradition, With a range of Tennis betting options to suit everyone from the serious tennis betting fan to the curious visitor that just wants to lay down $20 bucks on the matchup, the Australian Open is definitely the tennis match to be betting on in January.

Australian Open 2009, presented by Kia Motors in association with Garnier and GE Money, will take place at Melbourne Park, Melbourne, from 19 Jan. - 1 Feb. 2009.

Australian Open Betting


The Australian Open is one of only four of the Grand Slam tournaments. It’s a tournament loved by players and tennis bettors as well.

The Australasian Tennis championships started in 1905 and toured Australia. In 1969 the Open era began and in 1972 the tournament found a permanent home in Melbourne where it has stayed ever since. These days those partaking in tennis betting can catch the Australian Open action in January.

In 1972, it was decided to stage the Tournament in the one city each year, as opposed to visiting various states across the nation, and the Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club was selected due to Melbourne attracting the biggest patronage.

Melbourne Park (formerly Flinders Park) was constructed in time for the 1988 Open to meet the demands of the evolving tournament that had outgrown Kooyong's capacity.

Check out the odds on our Australian Open Tennis Schedule and put your money where your mouth is. Sportbet.com offers tennis odds on everything from the tournament winner to player vs player matchups.

Each week there will be a fairly comprehensive listing of the matchups and tennis betting lines offered by Sportbet.com on the different Tour events.