Daniel Brands triumphs over Stefano Galvani to secure a 2nd round spot – Salzburg Indoors 2011
German Daniel Brands eased past Stefano Galvani of Italy in straight sets at the Salzburg Indoors 2011, an ATP Challenger Tour event held at Salzburg Arena in Salzburg, Austria. He registered a 6-2, 7-5 victory over the 34-year-old
Italian veteran to advance into the second round on Tuesday.
24-year-old German put up a great display of tennis and after one hour and eleven minutes, he earned a straight set victory over Galvani on their first meeting. Ranked 138th in the South African Airways ATP World Tour
rankings, Brands confidently advanced into the pre-quarters of this indoor tournament and stayed on course for his second year-to-date challenger trophy.
After Galvani held his serve in the opening game, the former world number 66 Brands went into savage mode and reeled off following five games in a row. He then kept his serve to love in the eighth game to clinch the opener with
a 6-2 win.
The German saved the only breakpoint faced and cashed in half of the four breakpoint opportunities to his advantage. He also clobbered a convincing first serve share of 72 percent as compared to the Italian’s 61 percent and registered
an incredible 67 percent win on it.
Brands got the first blood in the final set and he maintained his lead by holding his remaining serves. Despite losing his edge in the sixth game, he went into overdrive mode and pull out the victory by breaking Italian’s serve
again in the eleventh game.
He manipulated a lower first serve share but covered it up by registering a spectacular 90 percent win on it. The German also fired eight massive aces, saved two out of three breakpoint opportunities and capitalised on two out
of four breakpoint opportunities to his advantage.
The German youngster made a final berth at Heilbronn Challenger in late January but fell to an eleven match losing streak. He snapped out from the streak with a style as Brands won his maiden Challenger title at Oberstaufen in
July. His season got lime light at Vienna where he made a semi-final showing as a qualifier. The German upset fourth seeded Czech Radek Stepanek in straight sets before losing to the top seeded French Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the last four.
Next challenge for Brands is the seventh seeded Slovene Grega Zemlja who earned a 6-7(7), 6-3, 2-0 retirement victory over his compatriot Aljaz Bedene. It took him almost one and half hour to overpower his countryman on their first
meeting.
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