Denis Istomin sails past Micke Kontinen into second round – IPP Open 2011 CH
Top seeded Uzbek Denis Istomin sailed into the second round of the 2011 IPP Open, an ATP Challenger event in Helsinki, Finland after a straight sets victory over local Micke Kontinen on Tuesday, November 22nd. Ranked
74th in the world and well above his opponent, Istomin took only seventy minutes as he secured a 6-3, 6-2 win over the Finn.
This was the pair’s first meeting ever on courts and Kontinen’s local support just wasn’t enough to cater for the huge disparity in the rankings.
Winning the toss, Istomin comfortably made it onto the scoreboard to go 1-0. Although Kontinen also made his way onto the scoreboard on his first service game, it wasn’t before he had to survive three deuces against the Uzbek.
The pair once more held onto their serves to bring the score to two games each. Serving out the fifth game, Istomin went 3-2 in the lead before extending it to 4-2 in the sixth, capitalizing off Kontinen’s errant stroke. A break up in the game, Istomin further
cemented his lead with a successful hold of his service registering 5-2 on the scoreboard. From there on the pair progressed on their own serves, as Istomin served out the set at 5-3 to go one up in the set score.
With three aces to match and only one double fault in the first set, Istomin clinched an impressive 79 percent on his first serve despite an average 50 percent accuracy on it. He managed to couple it with an acceptable 71 percent
win on it.
A set win in the lead, Istomin continued his onslaught against the local boy. Receiving in the first game, Istomin started off on a strong note in the second set as he broke his opponent and followed with a successful hold of serve
to clinch an early 2-0 lead. The next four games continued on serves as neither player managed to break the other despite pushing the game to deuces. Maintaining his one break lead, Istomin kicked into high gear in the seventh game as he converted another
breakpoint opportunity to his advantage to go 5-2 in the set before serving out the eighth game for a 6-2 win, sealing his straight sets victory.
Hitting a resounding total of eight more aces in the second set, Istomin managed to increase his total tally to 11 with only one more double fault in the second set. The winner clinched a total of 74 of 129 points in the match
to move into the second round where he plays Timo Nieminen or Michal Przysiezny.
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