ATP Masters Rome: Djokovic clears the opening hurdle
In his 17th participation in the ATP Masters tournament in Rome, defending champion Novak Djokovic defeated Argentinian Tomas Martin Etcheverry (ATP No. 61) 7: 6, 6: 2.
by Dietmar Kaspar
last edit:
May 12, 2023, 09:28 pm
Caution was advised for world number one Novak Djokovic in his first encounter with Tomas Martin Etcheverry. Even if the Argentine had lost all five matches against players from the top 20 so far, the 23-year-old convinced this season on the ATP tour with finals at the 250 clay court tournaments in Santiago and the rain festival in Houston.
Etcheverry didn't show any signs of initial nervousness. In the very first game he had two break chances, the second of which he was able to use due to a mistake by Djokovic. The Serbs initially noticed the small tournament break caused by skipping the Masters tournament in Madrid. Over the long rallies, however, he played his way into the match better and forced the decision of the first round in the tie-break. After a 3:5 deficit, the 22-time Grand Slam champion secured it after 80 minutes with four point wins in a row.
With the set win behind him, Djokovic acted much more confidently and kept throwing in his skilful stop balls. Without giving himself a chance to break, he took the service from his opponent twice and won 7:6 (5), 6:2 after a total of 1:52 hours of play.
After the match, Djokovic analyzed in the on-court interview: "It's never easy to play against someone for the first time. He's a real clay court specialist and started better than me. Towards the end of the first round I found my form and the second set was really good.”
In round 3, former ATP world champion Grigor Dimitrov is waiting for the 6-time Rome champion. The Bulgarian, who was in 26th place, defeated the three-time Grand Slam champion Stan Wawrinka from Switzerland 6: 4, 7: 6 (3).
Ruud and Rune win
There were straight victories for the Scandinavian top players. As No. 4 on the seed list, Casper Ruud defeated Arthur Rinderknech 6:4, 6:0. The Dane Holger Rune, who was in 7th position, also made it into the third round, triumphing 6:3, 6:3 against the French qualifier Arthur Fils.
Auger-Alliassime and Khachanov are defeated
Felix Auger-Alliassime remains without a sense of achievement on sand this season. In his second match after his knee injury, the No. 10 seeded Canadian fought Australian qualifier Alexei Popyrin for over three hours, but was defeated 4-6 6-4 5-7. No. 11 on the seed list Karen Khachanov also had to give up after the 6:4, 4:6, 6:7 defeat against Frenchman Gregoire Barrere in singles.
Here the single tableau from Rome
rommap