In danger of a second early exit in as many weeks in his home nation, Francisco Cerundolo used a late surge to escape an opening-round challenge from qualifier Yannick Hanfmann on Tuesday at the Argentina Open. The fifth seed won the final four games in a 6-2, 4-6, 7-5 victory, denying his opponent’s attempt to serve out the match at 5-4 in the final set.

After retiring with a leg injury last week in the Cordoba quarter-finals, Cerundolo started well at the ATP 250, cruising through the first set and opening up a 3-0 lead in the second without a break point faced. But Germany’s Hanfmann flipped the match on its head, winning nine of 11 games to claim the second set and build a 3-1 lead in the third.

With the backing of the home crowd, Cerundolo re-established himself in the match and began to step up his aggression in the late stages. He missed out on three break chances as Hanfmann held for 5-3, but that would be the last game the German won on the day as Cerundolo closed out the match with consecutive breaks.

The 24-year-old will next face Jaume Munar, who beat Argentine wild card Guido Pella 6-4, 7-5 on Monday night.

While Cerundolo avoided Hanfmann’s upset bid, eighth seed Albert Ramos-Vinolas could not do the same against fellow Spaniard Roberto Carballes Baena, who knocked him out with a 7-5, 6-4 victory.

Two Argentines also advanced in Tuesday’s early action. Camilo Ugo Carabelli defeated Daniel Elahi Galan 7-6(7), 6-3 and Tomas Etcheverry outlasted Hugo Dellien 3-6, 6-2, 6-2.

Stefanos Tsitsipas shook off some early struggles to make an ultimately confident start to his 2023 ABN AMRO Open campaign on Tuesday, when the top-seeded Greek defeated Emil Ruusuvuori 7-5, 6-1 in Rotterdam.

Tsitsipas was greeted with an early barrage of clean hitting from the World No. 52 Ruusuvuori at the indoor ATP 500 event. The Greek trailed 3-5 in the opening set but, as he has done so often already in the 2023 season, he dialled in behind his serve and forehand to grind his way back into the match. Tsitsipas won 10 of the next 11 games to accelerate away from the Finn for a one-hour, 33-minute victory.

“My footwork got better over time,” said Tsitsipas post-match. “I think I wasn’t very well adjusted in those first few games, and it took a little bit of time to find the right footwork, [get used to] the speed of the court, [acclimatise] to the new conditions.

“I had an opportunity in the last game [when Ruusuvuori led 5-3] to come back. I revived from that, I regenerated some awesome tennis and I recaptured that first set, which was crucial. I think from that point onwards it was flawless tennis. I was able to produce some really good shots.”

Ruusuvuori won just four games in his only previous ATP Head2Head meeting with Tsitsipas in Stockholm last October. The Finn appeared keen to emphasise early that there would be no repeat in Rotterdam as he hit his flat groundstrokes with aggression from the start and that strategy, along with some uncharacteristically wayward Tsitsipas serving, earned the Finn the first break of the match in the fifth game.

Despite a slow start by his standards, however, Tsitsipas did not panic. He began to find rhythm behind his forehand and ground out four games in a row from 3-5 to steal the set when he had spent much of it under pressure.

Once in front, Tsitsipas was clinical in making his advantage count. Looking increasingly comfortable from the baseline as the match wore on, he broke the Finn’s serve twice more in the second set to race to victory having converted four of his eight break points.

“The process that you get to repeat these things over and over again, it gives you tremendous understanding of how things actually work,” said Tsitsipas. “When you’re younger, you try your best but of course lack experience. I think being able to get in these moments more and more often on the Tour helps you understand, makes you wiser when you’re trying to deal with all these problems.”

Tsitsipas now holds a 13-1 record for the season, with his only defeat coming against Novak Djokovic in the Australian Open championship match. The 24-year-old’s next test in Rotterdam, where he reached the final in 2022, will be a second-round clash against Jannik Sinner or Benjamin Bonzi.

Felix Auger-Aliassime made a perfect start to his title defence at the ABN AMRO Open on Tuesday.

The Canadian fired past Italian Lorenzo Sonego 6-2, 6-3 to reach the second round in Rotterdam. The third seed saved the two break points he faced to advance to a second-round clash with Frenchman Gregoire Barrere after one hour and 22 minutes.

When Auger-Aliassime arrived in Rotterdam last year, he had not yet claimed an ATP Tour title and lost his first set of the tournament against Egor Gerasimov. He had no such difficulty against Sonego, whose spinny groundstrokes allowed the four-time tour-level champion to crush ball after ball from the baseline.

The defending champion also showed good feel around the net throughout the match to take a 2-0 ATP Head2Head lead against the Italian.

Hubert Hurkacz needed three hours to battle through the first match of the day, eliminating Roberto Bautista Agut 7-5, 6-7(7), 7-6(4). Bautista Agut had won the pair’s first three tour-level meetings, but Hurkacz saved six of the nine break points he faced to move on.

In other action, two-time Nitto ATP Finals champion Alexander Zverev ousted South Korea’s Soonwoo Kwon 6-4, 7-6(4) behind 10 aces. The German saved all three break points he faced and will next play Dutch wild card Tallon Griekspoor, who clawed past Swedish qualifier Mikael Ymer 7-6(7), 7-5.

“Every match for me is very important right now and obviously playing against very high-level players and having wins against them I think is very important for my confidence as well,” Zverev said. “We’ll see how this week goes, but I’m definitely excited for just every match that I’m going to play here.”

The ATP, WTA, ITF and the four Grand Slams – the Australian Open, Roland-Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open – have united to launch Tennis Plays for Love, a fundraising campaign to support those impacted by the devastating earthquakes in Turkey and Syria.

More than 17 million people in the affected region are now living in freezing winter conditions and urgently need blankets, emergency shelter, food and clean water.

The campaign, which kicks off with a joint donation by the tennis governing bodies, will benefit Global Giving’s Turkey and Syria Earthquake Relief Fund, helping provide emergency relief and fuel long-term recovery efforts. All fans can lend their support by donating via the fund’s official page.

In addition, a one-of-a-kind NFT from the ‘LOVE’ tennis art project is being auctioned in support of the campaign. Head over to OpenSea to place your bid before the auction’s close on Friday 17 February.

Tennis Plays for Love follows on from last year’s Tennis Plays for Peace campaign, which has so far raised more than US$3.5 million for those impacted by the war in Ukraine.

When the best stories of the tennis season are collated at the end of 2023, Matija Pecotic’s journey at the Delray Beach Open will certainly be among them.

The 33-year-old has a full-time job as the Director of Capital Markets for a real estate investment company and is No. 784 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings. So how did he end up in the main draw of an ATP Tour event for the first time? 

Pecotic never broke into the Top 1,000 in the ITF Junior Rankings, but he became a star at Princeton University, where he competed from 2009-13. The lefty was a three-time Ivy League Player of the Year and climbed as high as No. 2 in the college tennis rankings.

In 2014, the Croatian fully pursued professional tennis and the following year he ascended to a career-high World No. 206. But that was when he hit a roadblock. Just before the 2016 Australian Open he had a small surgery on his stomach.

“[I] ended up getting a serious staph infection and I was basically bed-ridden for eight months,” Pecotic said. “That changed the trajectory of my tennis timeline and my tennis career.”

The time off gave him time to think about his future. Pecotic decided to sit for the GMAT exam and apply for business school without any expectations. He was accepted to Harvard Business School, causing a dilemma: continue playing professional tennis or hit the books. Pecotic, who has competed in qualifying at all four Grand Slams, chose the latter.

While at Harvard, Pecotic connected with Andrew Rueb, a member of the Harvard men’s tennis coaching staff, and became a volunteer assistant coach.

“He said, ‘We hear you’re back on campus, we’d love to have you out with the guys.’ I had not been playing tennis for a while and he said you’re welcome to come out any time,” Pecotic recalled. “Soon enough I was with the guys six days a week and I started playing tennis again and I rediscovered my love for the game.”

Rueb, who in 2018 became the head coach at Harvard, said that Pecotic was clearly passionate about tennis during his time in Massachusetts.

“We all felt like he had another few chapters left in his tennis career. He served as our volunteer coach for a year and made a big difference in our program by imparting some of his veteran experience to our younger guys. I’m so glad he took another swing and went back on tour,” Rueb said. “Matija has a high competitive IQ and that made him a great coach. On Tour, you need so many pieces nowadays to fit into place to break the Top 100 and it is a steep mountain to climb.

“Certainly Matija has a huge heart and loves the grind of working hard. His footwork is also world class. We thought he had a chance to make it in the pros but making a comeback is always hard – especially when you are in your late-20s. We wish him the best of luck at Delray Beach.”

After graduating from Harvard with his degree in hand, Pecotic allowed himself one year to give professional tennis another shot.

“I was playing the best tennis of my life,” Pecotic said.

Although the lefty made progress, the Covid-19 pandemic closed that door. Now Pecotic is the Director of Capital Markets for Wexford Real Estate Investors, a subsidiary of the $4 billion investment firm Wexford Capital. He works a typical 9-6 schedule and tries to squeeze in tennis in the morning before work.

“I absolutely love this game and I know it’s not forever and I’m 33. I try to maximise each day. I try to train every morning if I can, five, six times a week,” Pecotic said. “Sometimes I train with my boss, who is 70 years old. This week I trained with a guy who is probably in his late 50s. But you find creative ways to work around it.”

Pecotic also hits the gym each day and enjoys a run after work. That put him in good enough position to take advantage of the opportunity he received this weekend in Delray Beach. The Croatian signed in as an alternate for the qualifying draw Friday evening and dropped off his racquets for stringing. He did not get in.

“I woke up on Saturday morning and I said, ‘I better drive down to Delray to pick up my tennis racquets.’ When I showed up, the supervisor said, ‘There’s a chance that you might get in’. So 30 minutes before the first match he said, ‘I think one guy’s going to pull out, but it’s not sure,’” Pecotic said. “A couple minutes later he said, ‘I think you’re in the tournament.’ Actually when I was going out to play [Stefan] Kozlov they announced my name as the guy who was originally supposed to play, so they said Kozlov and Watanuki, but it was actually me. I ended up playing.

“I played a tough match and to beat Tennys [Sandgren in the second round of qualifying] is a real special treat, but totally unexpected. I’m just enjoying it and going as far as I can. And if not, I’ll go back to work!”

What was it like to qualify? “Just sort of a moment of disbelief,” he said.

Pecotic will try to extend his fairytale run on Tuesday when he plays former World No. 8 Jack Sock.

Did You Know?
Pecotic was on Croatia’s United Cup team this year. “I love the format, I hope it keeps going and I think there are going to be a lot of good matches in the coming years,” he said. “It’s a great way to start the year, too.”

Laslo Djere improved to 4-0 in opening rounds this season with a 6-4, 6-4 victory against Fabio Fognini at the Argentina Open on Monday.

In a battling performance, the Serbian saved the first six break points he faced before Fognini denied his first attempt to serve out the match at 5-2. The Italian took a medical timeout after turning his ankle and held serve to put the pressure on his opponent, but Djere held to love to close out the one-hour, 37-minute match.

Djere, who was an efficient three-for-four on break points, will meet Buenos Aires debutant and top seed Carlos Alcaraz in the second round. It will be the pair’s first ATP Head2Head matchup.

Fognini fell to 0-3 on the year with defeat in what was the first clay-court match of 2023 for both players.

Argentina’s Pedro Cachin also advanced with a 7-6(2), 6-4 win against Thiago Monteiro to set up a second-round meeting with third seed Lorenzo Musetti, while Spain’s Bernabe Zapata Miralles scored a 6-1, 3-6, 6-4 win against countryman Pedro Martinez to book a matchup against fourth seed and home favourite Diego Schwartzman.

In Mondays’ fourth and final singles match in Buenos Aires, Spain’s Jaume Munar defeated Argentina’s Guido Pella 6-4, 7-5.

American Denis Kudla completed a comeback against Jordan Thompson on Monday at the Delray Beach Open with a dominant performance in a third-set tie-break. The 3-6, 6-4, 7-6(2) victory avenged a straight-sets loss for Kudla against the Aussie last week in Dallas.

“I thought we both served well, we were both playing pretty physical,” Kudla said post-match. “But whoever really got in front of the point stayed in front. Obviously it came down to a few points at the end and I was happy to execute.”

The 30-year-old was trailing by a set and an early break at the ATP 250, but immediately levelled the second set after losing his opening service game. He saved two break points midway through set two before forcing a final set with his second break of the match.

After a final set without a single break point, the Kiev-born Kudla took control of the tie-break by winning four straight points from 1/1. He survived 19 aces from Thompson in the two-hour, 36-minute match, hitting 22 winners in the victory. 

Second seed Tommy Paul awaits Kudla in the second round, with both men part of the United States Davis Cup team that beat Uzbekistan earlier this month. They will contest their second ATP Head2Head matchup, with Paul winning their previous encounter in 2019 in Washington. Kudla beat Paul in four other professional matches below tour-level from 2015-18.

Ecuador’s Emilio Gomez also advanced early on Monday with a 7-6(3), 6-4 win against Wu Tung-Lin. The son of former world No. 4 Andres Gomez, the 30-year-old reached his first ATP Tour quarter-final last week in Dallas. He will meet top seed Taylor Fritz next.

Later in the day, Portuguese qualifier Nuno Borges defeated lucky loser Steve Johnson 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 to set up a second-round meeting with fourth seed Miomir Kecmanovic. It was the second time in as many days that Borges beat Johnson, after his straight-sets win against the American in the final round of qualifying on Sunday.