James Blake stuns Juan Martin Del Potro in the second round – If Stockholm Open 2011
Local crowd at Stockholm, Sweden, was in for a huge surprise, as the 69th ranked American competitor, James Blake, stunned the world number 15, Juan Martin Del Potro of Argentina, in the second round of the If Stockholm
Open on Wednesday evening.
The former world number four, Blake, put up a magnificent display of hard-court tennis to dispense out the second seed and the hot favourite Del Potro in straight sets, 6-4, 6-4, moving into the quarter-finals of the ATP (Association
of Tennis Professionals) World Tour 250 tournament.
31-year-old American veteran outplayed Del Potro in every segment of the game to register his 17th victory of the running ATP season. He finally ended the two-match losing streak against the Argentine, who defeated Blake
in the second round of the Farmers Classic this year as well. Blake’s emphatic victory over Del Potro levelled his head-to-head series at 2-2 against the Argentine and booked him a place in his first quarter-final of the running year.
“This is my best win in the last three years I’d say,” declared Blake. “I played some of my best tennis and I'm really proud of it... He's going to be a great champion for many years so I'll be proud of this one for a long time.
Juan Martin is an excellent player and he made me work for everything. I felt coming into Stockholm, I had some confidence. The body feels good for a change. We had a tight match earlier in the summer and the breaks just went my way today.”
Blake collected 28 out of his 34 first serve points in the game to wrap up victory in one hour and twenty seven minutes to advance to the round of eight. He converted two of his four break opportunities in the contest and didn’t
face a single break point from Del Potro in the entire matchup. He nailed break points in the 10th games of both sets to drive Del Potro out of the competition in his very first match. A total of 120 points were played in the contest and Blake secured
66, while the Argentine lagged behind with 54 points to finish on the losing side in the end.
Blake will either take on the seventh seed Croatian, Ivan Dodig, or the former world number three, David Nalbandian of Argentina, in the quarter-final to make it to the final four. Dodig and Nalbandian will compete on Thursday
and the winner will meet Blake in the quarter-final clash.
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