Edouard Roger-Vasselin struggles past Arnaud Clement to reach the final – Granby Challenger 2011
In the first semi-final of the National Bank’s Challenger of Granby, the sixth seed, Edouard Roger-Vasselin of France laboured hard to win the battle against his seventh seeded fellow compatriot, Arnaud Clement on Saturday afternoon.
The contest was staged on the hard courts of Granby, Canada, with two of the top seeded players putting up an enthralling matchup to win a place in the final of the ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) Challenger Tour event. The three-set thriller took two hours and five minutes to settle, with Roger-Vasselin settling the final scores at 1-6, 6-3, 6-3, to move into the final of the tournament, due to be played on Sunday afternoon.
Seeded seventh in the tournament, Clement had a brilliant start to the contest and appeared as if the French will comprehensively bag victory against his fellow countryman but a major momentum swing in the second set changed the course of the game completely. Clement was off to a flyer in the opener and despite of an ordinary serve precision of 54 per cent, he clinched 10 out of 13 first serve points to put his opponent under pressure early.
33-year-old Clement crafted nine opportunities to break his opponent’s serve in the opening set and converted two out of them to his advantage. Roger-Vasselin held his serve in merely one game in the opener and failed to secure a number of easy points to let his opponent away with the first set at 6-1.
Roger-Vasselin’s performance in the first set hinted that Clement will cruise through the second set as well to conclude an easy victory but it actually happened the other way round. The sixth seeded French came out firing at Clement in the second set and broke his serve right away to reveal his intentions. Clement retaliated with a serve break as well but a second break point conversion from his opponent sealed the set for him at 6-3, levelling the matchup with one set a piece.
Roger-Vasselin carried on his winning impetus in the final set as well, securing 15 first serve points and registering two more serve breaks to cruise to victory. The French closed the third set at 6-3 to book a berth in the final of the National Bank’s Challenger of Granby where he will face the second seeded German opponent, Matthias Bachinger, for the title. The German won his semi-final matchup against Karol Beck of Slovakia, 6-1, 3-6, 6-4, to meet Roger-Vasselin in the final showdown.
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