Dmitry Tursunov dumps Ivan Dodig to clinch the title win – UNICEF Open 2011
Former world number 20, Dmitry Tursunov of Russia, stunned everyone present at the Autotron park in Rosmalen, near 's-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands, when he disposed off the fourth seed Croatian, Ivan Dodig in the final of the UNICEF
Open on Saturday.
The contest ended in the 77th minute of play, with an emphatic straight sets victory for Tursunov at 6-3, 6-2. It was the second grass-court title for the 53rd ranked Russian and the first ever victory against
Dodig to enter the winners circle in the running ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) season.
The contest was pretty one-sided, as the belligerent Russian dominated most of the time with his accurate and risk-free approach. Tursunov never dropped his serve in the entire contest and successfully defended the three break
points he faced from his opponent in the game.
“I’ve had a lot of good results this year, but not on the ATP (World Tour),” Tursunov expressed after claiming the championship on Saturday afternoon, “The start of the year was horrendous for me, in Australia I didn’t do very
well and I definitely didn’t expect myself to be doing the way I’m doing right now. After being in tennis a long time now, I understand one week can be terrible and one week can be great. I happened to do all the right things at the right moments this week
and I won.”
The fourth seed in the tournament, Dodig was anticipated as the favourite to win the final but the Croat badly failed to put up any serious challenge to take down his opponent and surrendered the contest in the second set. His
errant stroke play and large number of unforced errors contributed to his eventually fall in the contest, letting Tursunov away with an easy title victory.
The unseeded Russian delivered 74 per cent of his serve on target and reeled off 18 out of 25 first serve points to get the early in the opening set. Dodig squandered away three of his break opportunities and suffered a crucial
serve break from Tursunov in the seventh game to drop the first set at 3-6.
Dodig raised his first serve accuracy to 72 percent in the following set but failed to bag sufficient points on it. Tursunov kept exerting pressure upon the crumbling Croat and stung two serve breaks in the second set to exacerbate
his position in the match. A decisive forehand blow from the Russian sealed victory for him at 6-2, earning him a ATP World Tour 250 championship title and a reel confidence boost for his Wimbledon campaign.
Tags: