Alessandro Giannessi overcomes Harri Heliovaara in the first round – Kosice Open 2012
Top seed, Alessandro Giannessi of Italy, survived some serious challenge from the world number 241, Harri Heliovaara, beating him in three sets 7-6(1), 4-6, 6-3 in the opening round at the Kosice Open in Slovakia.
Giannessi and Heliovaara served exceptionally well in the first set, as they did not allow each other to break even once till the end, squaring off the score at 6-6 and taking it to a tie-breaker. The Italian, however, completely
dominated afterwards, allowing Heliovaara to claim only one points and sealing it 7-6(1).
Ranked 126th in the world, Giannessi gave an erratic performance on the second serves, committing three double faults and 13 of the 20 points. Though, he was better on the first ones, hitting one ace and capturing 18
of the 23 points.
Giannessi got full command on the proceedings, as he grabbed opening three games of the second set to build a 3-0 lead. However, Heliovaara made an impressive comeback later on, capturing five consecutively and taking the score
to 5-3 in his favour. Giannessi broke his opponent’s winning streak by holding his serve in the ninth but lost the next one to go down 4-6.
Heliovaara banged in a couple of aces and 76 percent of the first serves, claiming 13 of the 19 first and four of the six second delivery points. On the other hand, Giannessi’s serve performance dropped drastically, as he did not
hit any ace and committed three double faults.
Just like the previous set, Giannessi broke his Finn rival in the second game of the final set and won his subsequent serve to attain a 3-0 lead. However, the Italian sustained his advantage throughout and closed it 6-3.
The Italian needed two hours and 32 minutes to outlast his opponent in a tough contest.
Giannessi failed to hit any ace and made one double fault in the decider but this time his other statistics were far better, keeping his first serve percentage at 81 and converting 19 of the 26 of them into points.
The 22-year-old is drawn to play Nils Langer of Germany in the second round.
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