Australian Open tennis start list

There is no doubt that Roger Federer and Raphael Nadal will start favourites for the Australian Open.

It's interesting to see that Juan Martin Del Potro is currently nestled between the two in terms of favouritism stakes.

Granted, it's always hard to go past a champion and you'll be getting better than even money on Federer. The media are much more quiet than they were last year when the Fed's pre-event results were just as poor as they are this year.

I guess they're not quite as keen to have mud on their face in case he again finishes the year as the world's top-ranked player.

But let's look at form. Del Potro is fresh from a big win but hasn't played the traditional warm up events. That makes him somewhat of an unknown quantity and difficult to back.

Slide down the list to Nikolay Davydenko. He's the form player, coming from his masters win late last year and his win in last week's warm up event, where he came back from a bagel down in the first set to defeat Raffa.

It's always difficult to bet on Davydenko. In the big money events, he's likely to come out and surprise everyone, yet he's equally able to "throw" - whether intentional or not - his first round match. But at 10/1, he's worth a small investment.

The other one is Robin Soderling. The Swede broke a 12-match losing streak against Federer in Abu Dhabi and has beaten Nadal two out of their last three encounters. He's not yet at the point where he'll consistently win Grand Slams and word is he's not overly liked by the players. But he is erratically capable of anything.

At 25/1, Soderling is a tall man with a big serve and he likes the Melbourne surface. At the odds, he's well worth an investment.

In the women's event, Kim Clijsters (3/1) looks hard to beat, especially if Justine Henin is ruled out. It's not smart to totally eliminate the Williams sisters, particularly Serena who as world number 1 will start favourite to win the event.

But Clijsters is the form player - looking fit and happy.

For those looking for an outsider, Elena Dementieva fires up at 14/1. There was a time last year when she strung together more than 10 games on the trot and was the world's form player, until she fell heavily to American giant killer Melanie Oudin.