Alex Bogomolov crushes Dino Marcan in the opening round – PBZ Zagreb Indoors 2012
Second seed, Alex Bogomolov, destroyed the local wild card entrant, Dino Marcan, with a breadstick at the PBZ Zagreb Indoors 2012 on Tuesday. He registered a 6-3, 6-1 victory over Marcan, who had the crowd support, at this ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) World Tour 250 series event taking place on the hard courts in Zagreb, Croatia.
Bogomolov, the ATP Most Improved Player of the Year award recipient, stayed on course for his maiden ATP career title after dumping the Croat in almost an hour-long marathon. The contestants previously met each other in the qualifiers of this event last year and after earning this success, the Russian maintained his winning record against Marcan.
The 28-year-old Russian stormed into the opening set at Dom Sportova and drew the first blood in the opening game. He then swiped in entire serves after warding off all three breakpoints he came across and cashed in another break opportunity in the last game to clinch the opener with a 6-3 score line.
Bogomolov carried his rhythm in the following set and held his serve comfortably in the opening game. After Marcan levelled the scores at 1-1, the Russian blasted powerful groundstrokes to stroke out the next five games successively and registered an assuring 6-1 win.
The Florida resident, Bogomolov showed tremendous skills throughout the battle. He barely sweated in the last set and hammered four aces in the match. The Russian also formulated a better first serve share and impressively penned down 34 out of 50 points on it.
Next in line for the Russian is Lukas Lacko of Slovakia who overwhelmed resilience posed by the Italian challenger, Potito Starace, to set-up this meeting. He overpowered the world number 58, Starace, with a single break of serve in the third set. Lacko saved the only breakpoint he faced and eventually registered a 7-6(2), 6-7(4), 6-3 success in two hours and 13 minutes.
In another match, third seed Mikhail Youzhny edged past the Ukrainian contestant, Sergiy Stakhovsky, in straight sets to accompany his compatriot, Bogomolov, in the second round. He drew the first blood in the opening game of the match and ultimately bagged the opener with a 6-4 score. The Russian carried his ways in the following set and broke Stakhovsky’s serve in the fifth game to take the lead again. Despite losing his serve in the tenth game, Youzhny took the set to a tie-breaker and dominated in it to seal the set with a 7-6(4) win.
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