Feliciano Lopez battles past Marsel Ilhan into second round – China Open 2011
Spanish tennis pro Feliciano Lopez defeated Marsel Ilhan of Turkey 6-2, 7-6 (8) on Monday to advance into the second round of 2011 China Open here at the National Tennis Centre in Beijing, China.
Lopez looked to attack his opponent right from the start of the match. Dropping only a couple of games, he took the opening set in a blink of an eye. Ilhan put a brave fight in second set as he forced the set into a tie-breaker.
However, he failed to control his nerves in a very tense finish to let his opponent clinch a straight sets victory.
Breaking serve twice in the opening set, Lopez raced to an impassable 5-2 lead. Converting the very first set point, he took the set score lead. Although the second set went into a tie-breaker, the Spaniard showed great determination
and fighting spirit as he closed out the match in straight sets.
Hitting his blistering serves aces throughout the match, Lopez earned valuable points on his service games to take control of the contest. Converting 89 per cent of the points on first serves, he did not allow the challenger to
win a single break point in the match. With his rock solid defence, Lopez managed to save crucial points against him.
Ilhan took some time to settle in the match as he looked completely out of sorts in the first set. Making costly double faults and unforced errors, he allowed Lopez to dictate terms early on. Raising the level of his game play
in second set, he held on to all of his service games. Hitting 11 serve aces in the match, he avoided trouble with his formidable serving skills on various occasions.
Ranked 28th in the Association of Tennis Professional’s rankings, Lopez will be very content with the he responded to very tricky situations during the contest. Still in pursuit of his first title of this season, Lopez will be
hoping to continue his superb in the upcoming matches as well.
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