Bjorn Phau eases past
Paolo Lorenzi to second round - San Marino CEPU
Open 2011 CH
Tuesday’s match between German Bjorn Phau and Italian Paolo Lorenzi, went in Phau’s way in an elegantly crafted 6-3, 7-5 win over his opponent. This match proved to be the longest of the fixtures scheduled for the day as it rambled
on for a little over two hours and saw a flurry of breakpoints. Phau is now through to the second round of the ATP Challenger at San Marino’s red clay tennis courts.
A former World No. 59, Phau had a flamboyant start to the season by registering a quarter final performance against Xavier Malisse at Chennai, India in January. He continued participating on the ATP tour circuit for almost four
months but seldom managed to get past the first round of the tournament. Phau had successfully qualified for the main draw at Rolland Garros but was quickly dismissed by Gael Monfils in its opening round. In June he grabbed his sole Challenger title for the
season at his home event in Marburg, Germany.
Lorenzi meanwhile is currently positioned at the 142nd position on the rankings table, down from his 2009’s career high of 83. With a 2-3 win loss mark at the ATP tour for the year, the Italian won his sole challenger
title in April at Pereira, Colombia. Besides this win, Lorenzi managed to reach 3 challenger quarterfinals and 2 semi finals on tour this year. On the ATP tour, Lorenzi’s best performance was at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 Rome, Italy in May where he qualified
and eased past Thomaz Bellucci to reach the tournament’s second round. He lost his second round match to Spanish Star Rafael Nadal in three sets.
Both the sets saw a frenzied exchange of breakpoints between the two contenders, with an astounding 9 breakpoints registered till the match’s end. Phau broke Lorenzi in the first set’s opening game but the Italian fired back with
an equally devastating break of serve in the second game, balancing the scores 1-1. The set progressed calmly for the next few games but with both the players remaining within fighting distance throughout. Phau managed to put an end to the stagnancy that had
settled in by now and be recording two blistering serve breaks in games 7 and 9, sealed the set 6-3 in his account.
The second set proved to be even more competitive since Lorenzi improved his serve percentage to 67%, considerably greater than the German’s 55%. However both the players managed to bag 54% first serve points in this set. Games
3, 4 and 5 again saw a heated crossfire of breakpoints; Lorenzi astonished everyone by recording 2 against Phau’s 1. However Phau managed to restore semblance by registering a breakpoint further in the game to level the score at 5-5 and eventually took away
the second set too at 7-5 in decisive style by breaking Lorenzi’s serve in the very last game.
Phau will next meet his toughest competition in the tournament yet when he faces off third seed Filippo Volandri to battle for a place in the third round at San Marino. Volandri had earlier eased past Daniele Giorgini 6-1, 6-2
in their first round match.
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