The young Pedro Araújo and the veteran Mischa Zverev (ex-Top 25 ATP) stamped this Wednesday, March 3, the passage to the second round of the main singles team. Faro Open, in tennis. The day was also marked by the withdrawal of Gastão Elias.
A week after he shone in Vale do Lobo, where he reached the quarter-finals of the singles for the first time in a tournament on the international circuit, Pedro Araújo (1326th in the ATP ranking) added another victory.
This time, the Portuguese won by clear 6-0 and 6-1 against compatriot Luís Faria (808.º), in a match in which the 18-year-old Lisboner showed better physical shape and more competitive rhythm than the Guimarães, 21 years old.
Qualified for the second round, the Tennis School player Jaime Caldeira already knows that he will have as his next opponent the Frenchman Dan Added (396th ATP), who confirmed the status of seventh seed by beating the German Lucas Gerch, by 6-3 and 6-3.
Pedro Araújo's victory was the only one for Portuguese tennis players in the singles.
Before, Fábio Coelho offered a good reply, but lost 6-2 and 6-3 to German Sebastian Fanselow (429.º), who lives and trains in Lisbon. In the second half of the matchday, Tiago Cação (553.º ATP) showed an increase in relation to the previous week before losing 6-4, 5-7 and 6-2 to the Turkish Kuzey Cekirge (1322.º) , in 2:27, and Gastão Elias (381.º) gave up after losing the first set, by 6-1, against the Slovenian Tomas Lipovsek Puches (618.º) — tennis player who he defeated last week.
“There is not much to say. My coach and I had already debated whether it would be a good idea to play this week or not, because the last one, in Vale do Lobo, was tough. My arm is not at 100% and it would be nice to have a few days of rest. Perhaps the body is in need of a little more 'time' and as I felt without energy and with some discomfort I thought it was not worth sacrificing myself and putting the next weeks at risk. I thought it was better to take it easy, but it's nothing serious», justified Gastão Elias, about the short return to the Tennis and Padel Center in Faro.
After the Portuguese “flood”, the day ended with the victory of Mischa Zverev. The former top 25 ATP and current 278th grabbed the status of first seed and won the to qualify Frenchman Vincent Stouff (1088.º), 6-2, 2-6 and 6-1, in a match in which, despite the drop in performance in the second game, he exhibited some of the classic tennis — supported by service-volley and strokes in slice — which took him to the greatest stages in the world.
The reasons that brought the brother of world number 7, Alexander Zverev, to Faro they are the same ones that took him six months ago to Castelo Branco and Porto, cities where he also played tournaments on the ITF circuit.
“At this point there aren't many fast-track tournaments in Europe and I love Portugal, so it all fitted together perfectly. Next week I'm going to Acapulco with my brother and as I haven't played that much, I'd like to be able to make some matches here», he explained, before talking about the different conditions he found in relation to the period he spent in Australia.
“I trained with Sascha in Melbourne for two months and the conditions are obviously very, very different. It's not that hot here, there's some wind and the courts are a little slower. But in the first rounds what matters is winning and if we exclude the second set I think I did a good performance, so I'm satisfied», he said.
Also this Wednesday, Gonçalo Falcão and Turkey's Tuna Altuna confirmed their status as pre-designated runners-up by beating Frenchmen Alexis Musialek and Hugo Pontico, by 7-6 (3) and 6-4, to reach the quarter-finals of the variant of pairs, phase to which Frederico Gil and Fábio Coelho had already advanced in the previous journey.
In the opposite direction, Pedro Araújo and Luís Faria lost 6-4 and 6-3 to Louis Dussin and Quentin Robert and, alongside American John-Paul Fruttero (who was the first seed), Francisco Cabral stayed close to victory against Lucas Poullain and Vincent Stouff, who triumphed 6-0, 2-6 and 10-6.
Comments