ATP Roland Garros: Stefanos Tsitsipas, Kei Nishikori and David Goffin win
World no. 6 Stefanos Tsitsipas will compete in the third round at Roland Garros for the first time, defeating Hugo Dellien 4-6, 6-0, 6-3 7-5 in challenging two hours and 49 minutes. The Bolivian is playing his career-best tennis this year and he presented that against the young Greek, taking the opening set and leading 4-2 in set number four before Stefanos found the way to bring the encounter home in four sets and avoid a possible upset. Rushing to the net and keeping the points on his racquet whenever it was possible, Stefanos blasted 42 winners and 34 unforced errors, keeping Dellien on a 31-44 ratio and taking 30 points more overall to emerge as a deserved winner. Madrid finalist took almost half of the return points and earned eight breaks from 16 opportunities, giving serve away only three times and hoping for even better performance in his next test in two days.
From 3-1 down in the opening set, Hugo picked up the pace and claimed five of the next six games, pulling the break back in game six and securing the set with another break in game ten. Stefanos had to raise the level and he did that in set number two, delivering a bagel and sailing through the third set with a double break to take two sets to one lead. Ready to fight for every point, Dellien kicked off the fourth set with a break of serve that pushed him 4-2 up, looking good to force the decider before Tstisipas broke back in game eight to level the score at 4-4. The Bolivian erased three match points in game ten and couldn't do the same two games later, allowing Stefanos to break him and move into the last 32. Competing in the fourth Grand Slam tournament, the young gun Corentin Moutet advanced into the third round with a 6-3, 6-1, 2-6, 7-5 victory over the 19th seed Guido Pella in two hours and 31 minutes.
Carried by the home crowd on Court 7, Corentin played one of the career-best matches, landing 36 winners and 37 unforced errors and overpowering the seeded player in every department to reach the third round safely. Both players had their chances on the return, with Pella converting six out of ten and surrounding serve nine times to end his run earlier than expected. Moutet was off to a strong start, breaking Guido twice in the opening set and dominating in the second for a massive lead and a big step towards the finish line. The Argentine responded in set number three with three breaks on his tally, coming from 5-0 down in the fourth before Corentin claimed the last two games to push himself over the top. David Goffin came to Paris with just ten wins under his belt in 2019 and things are looking better for him after the second round win over Miomir Kecmanovic, ousting the youngster 6-2, 6-4, 6-3 in an hour and 49 minutes, hitting more winners than unforced errors and getting broken just twice.
On the other hand, he converted seven out of 19 break chances, enough to keep him ahead all the time. Miomir broke David twice in a row at the beginning of the second set but the problem was he suffered three breaks in the meanwhile, ending his first Roland Garros campaign with the first Grand Slam win. Laslo Djere took down a former junior champion Alexei Popyrin 6-4, 7-6, 6-4 in two hours and 15 minutes for the third Grand Slam triumph, fending off all six break points and breaking the Aussie twice to cross the finish line in straight sets despite winning only 12 points more. Making Grand Slam debut, Juan Ignacio Londero will compete in the third round after a 6-2, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 win over Richard Gasquet in two hours and 14 minutes, breaking the Frenchman five times and taming his shots more efficiently to prolong his Parisian run for at least one more round.
In one of the most anticipated matches of the day, a former quarter-finalist Kei Nishikori defeated the crowd favorite and a former semi-finalist Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 4-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4, avenging 2015 quarter-final loss. The encounter lasted three hours and two minutes and it was a battle of the small margins, with Kei who stole rival's serve six times and surrendered four service games to forge the crucial difference, overcoming a 3-0 deficit in set number four to avoid the decider with a strong run in the last games.
from Tennis World USA http://bit.ly/2MuZJqz
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