Eighth-seeded Taylor Fritz and 12th-seeded Alexander Zverev bid an early farewell to the Australian Open who were defeated this Thursday by Australian Alexei Popyrin and American Michael Mmoh, respectively.
Popyrin, 113 in the world and playing in the tournament by invitation, reached the third round with a hard-fought victory over the ninth-ranked player, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (2), 6-4, 6 -7 (6) and 6-2.
The party lasted up to four hours, during which the equality was greater than expected the position of both players in the ATP ranking. The first service break didn’t come until the third game of the third set, when Popyrin took a 2-1 lead.
They exchanged breaks in the fourth set, which went to the North American after a new tiebreaker, and in the fifth the favorite could not maintain the level of his service, while the Australian was very brave in the rest.
Popyrin’s next rival was another American, Ben Shelton.
Zverev also saw his path to the Open interrupted by a loss to Mmoh (107) of 6-7 (1), 6-4, 6-3 and 6-2.
The ease with which he won the ‘tie-break’ of the first set did not help him to face the following with confidence.
Mmoh, caught in the previous phase, took advantage of the lack of German film production, who spent most of 2022 in white after breaking his ankle at Roland Garros. Without needing to risk too much, he waited out the many unforced errors of Zverev (58), still far from his best form.
His compatriot Jeffrey John Wolf (67 ATP) is the next rival of Mmm.
Zverev and Fritz join Casper Ruud, who lost hours earlier against Jenson Brooksby 6-3, 7-5, 6-7(4) and 6-2. The American did not lose heart after letting as many as three match points escape in the third set which fell to the Norwegian side and he will face his compatriot Tommy Paul in the next round.
Both players enjoyed almost the same break balls, 13 for the American and 12 for the European, but the Californian was more effective when it came to confirming the break after executing nine of them as opposed to Ruud’s four.
Despite his early exit from the tournament, the Norwegian would add 45 points after he missed the 2022 edition due to injury.
However, he will not be able to complete the feat of becoming the new number one and Serbian Novak Djokovic (4) along with Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas are the only tennis players who have a chance to do so should they lift the champion title.
Source: La Verdad
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