2011 Heineken Open: Juan Monaco suffers early exit in Auckland
The 26-year-old Juan Monaco of Argentina has bundled out of the 2011 Heineken Open tennis tournament on Tuesday. The fifth seed was stunned by world number 88 Adrian Mannarino of France in two sets. The final match score was 6-4,
6-3. The battle concluded in a time period of one and a half hour.
The French qualifier, Adrian, played some impressive tennis to get past his higher ranked foe in Auckland. Monaco, as a result of this loss, is the first seed to suffer an early exit from the competition in 2011.
Adrian, throughout his match, played with high level of accuracy and took his chances fully to emerge victorious in the end.
In the opening set of the match, the French player broke his foe during the fourth game with the help of a strong serve to earn a lead of 3-1. Monaco, however, did not give up and thus bounced back in the following game, firing
some strong ground strokes around the court. After this temporary attacking flair though, it was more like a one sided affair as Monaco eventually lost the first set at 6-4.
The decisive set did not change the story for the Argentinean as Adrian immediately took a lead of 3-1 and successfully maintained that till the end to wrap up the match.
Mannarino, as a result of this victory, will next take on the winner of the match between Arnaud Clement and Xavier Malisse of Belgium.
The fifth seed Monaco, on the other hand, will play at the year’s opening Grand Slam, the Australian Open, starting next week in Melbourne.
Meanwhile, Thomas Belluci also posted a three setter victory over Mike Russell, a qualifier from the United States of America. The final match score was 6-4, 6-7, 7-5. The match was stretched to a time period of three hours.
Thomas was close to victory in the second set, however, the left hander lost in the tie breaker and thus forced the match into the third set where he eventually clinched a well deserved win.
World number 51 Victor Hanescu of Romania also got past South African Kevin Anderson in three sets, in another round 1 match.
Tags: