Jarkko Nieminen battles past Thomaz Bellucci into second round – Davidoff Swiss Indoors 2011
Finland’s Jarkko Nieminen bounces back to register a 6-7(5), 6-4, 6-3 victory over the Brazilian Thomaz Bellucci at the Davidoff Swiss Indoors 2011, an ATP World Tour 500 series event taking place on the indoor hard courts in Basel,
Switzerland on Tuesday. After earning this success, the Finn set-up date with a former world number one Roger Federer in the second round.
Meeting for the third time, Nieminen not only avenged his loss at Barcelona last year but also took lead in the head-to-head series by 2-1 against the Brazilian.
World number thirty-eight Bellucci blasted at St. Jakobshalle and got the first blood in the opening game. However, he failed to save the only breakpoint faced and dragged the set to a tie-breaker. The Brazilian dominated in it
to clinch the opener with a 7-6(5) score line.
The furious Finn re-formed in the second set. He smoothly plucked in entire serves without facing any breakpoint. In addition to this, Nieminen broke the Brazilian’s serve in the last game to win the equaliser with a 6-4 success.
He manipulated a lower first serve share of 58 percent as compared to Bellucci’s 74 percent but earned a superb 86 percent win on it.
Nieminen maintained consistency in his game in the final set. After Bellucci held his third serve, the Finn unleashed flurry of groundstrokes to reel off next four games in a row. He brushed off both breakpoints came across and
cashed in half of the four breakpoint opportunities to his advantage to bag the decider with a 6-3 victory.
Summing up Finn’s performance, he formulated a better first serve share of 70 percent in contrast with the Brazilian’s 61 percent and registered an impressive 61 percent win on it. In addition to this, he capitalised on the seven
double faults and several unforced errors his rival spilled and hammered nine aces to put a cherry on the match.
His next challenge, Swiss Federer, is a four times champion here and Nieminen needs to lift up his game to overwhelm world number four’s resilience.
The Swiss Master fended off early resistance to register a 7-6(3), 6-4 victory over the Italian Potito Starace on Monday. He saved the only breakpoint faced and capitalised on one out of three breakpoint opportunities to his advantage
to clinch convincingly. Despite committing more errors and five double faults, Federer manipulated a better first serve share and registered a tremendous 88 percent win on it.
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