Long time no see.
Indeed. Excellent chance. Both faves are priced about the same. Cecchinato appears to be a veritable lucky loser semifinal player in the sense that every few years you'll get a freak guy out of nowhere in the slams that will appear in the semis. For example,
Ginepri
Victor Hanescu
And so many others that I can't remember. But Cecchi is a tier below even those guys. Thiem is most likely a future slam winner. He's already beat Nadal 3 separate times on clay in different tournaments and is a proven asset. In fact, I don't know if there is another active player or any other player that has beaten Nadal 3 times on clay... have to think about that one.
Anyways, my point is that if there is a live dog for Friday, it is most likely Delpo. The problem is the 5 sets. If this were 3 sets, you could take Delpo all day. But Nadal wears people down and fights to the death. I remember their Indian Wells final and Delpo was pulverizing Nadal and I think was up a set and a break.... but he wore him down. And that was a 3-setter. In a 5-setter... forget about it.
I will say this. If Delpo is to win, it's likely in 4 sets or less. He'd have to finish him the way Soderling did. Four sets. So if you take Delpo, you're probably better off 3-1 or Delpo -1.5 sets..... higher payout.