Kyrgios Impresses In Cincy Opener
Kyrgios Impresses In Cincy Opener
Dimitrov also advances to second round
Nick Kyrgios needed only 67 minutes to get past Frenchman Lucas Pouille 6-2, 7-5 and move into the second round of the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati on Monday evening.
The Aussie was locked in from the start of Monday’s final match on center court. Kyrgios, the 14th seed at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament, hit 29 winners, including 16 aces, and broke Pouille three times in the first-round contest. At 5-all in the second set, the 21 year old ripped a backhand pass to break Pouille. He celebrated with a “Let’s go!” shout. Kyrgios finished the match with his 16th ace.
The top-ranked #NextGen player will next face another #NextGen member in Croatian Borna Coric.
Reilly Opelka keeps checking off the milestones this month.
Two weeks ago, the 18-year-old American used a wild card to grab his first ATP World Tour singles win at the BB&T Atlanta Open. On Monday, the Florida resident grabbed his first ATP World Tour Masters 1000 victory at the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati.
Opelka, who also received a wild card in Cincinnati, saved two match points and hit 18 aces to prevail past Frenchman Jeremy Chardy 3-6, 7-5, 7-6(9). The 6’11” Opelka, No. 364 in the Emirates ATP Rankings, took advantage of his only break point of the second set and broke Chardy at 6-5. Neither player lost his serve in the third set, and Chardy had match points at 6/5 and 8/7 in the tie-break. But Opelka erased them both and earned a mini-break at 9/9 to serve for the match.
The right-hander will face another Frenchman in the second round, seventh seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, who’s trying to reach the third round in Cincinnati and achieve best result at the Masters 1000 tournament.
Grigor Dimitrov saved both break points and won almost 80 per cent of his first-serve points to beat Frenchman Gilles Simon 6-1, 6-3. The Bulgarian will next face 16th seed Feliciano Lopez or German qualifier Mischa Zverev.
DOUBLES
Canadian Milos Raonic earned his second doubles win of the season when he and Serbian Nenad Zimonjic came back to beat the French team of Julien Benneteau and Edouard Roger-Vasselin 4-6, 7-5, 10-3. Raonic/Zimonjic will next face eighth seeds Rajeev Ram and Raven Klaasen.
Pablo Cuevas, who beat Sam Querrey in singles on Monday, made it two-for-two when he and Marcel Granollers advanced to the second round with a 6-2, 6-4 win against Lukasz Kubot of Poland and Alexander Peya of Austria. Cuevas/Granollers will next meet third seeds Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares.
