John Isner prevails over Janko Tipsarevic in the third round – London Olympics
Seeded 10th in the draw, John Isner of USA toppled Serbia’s Janko Tipsarevic in straight sets 7-5, 7-6(13) to move to the last-eight stage at the London Olympics on Wednesday. The top American tennis player needed an
hour and 30 minutes to throw his seventh seeded opponent out of the competition.
Isner and Tipsarevic put on a superb serving display in the opener, winning it in the first 11 games to take the score to 6-5 in the American’s favour. Serving to stay in contention at that moment, Tipsarevic’s standard went down
drastically, as he failed to claim even a single point, losing it 5-7.
In the second set, Isner and his Serbian rival served even better than the previous one, as none of the two players got broken till the end, evening out the proceedings at 6-6 and taking it to a tie-breaker. Tipsarevic made a better
start, as he grabbed five of the opening seven points to build a 5-2 lead but Isner clawed his way back to equalise the score at 6-6. They went neck to neck in the subsequent 14 points, taking the score to 13-13. Finally, Tipsarevic committed a double fault
at 13-14 to hand over the set to Isner 7-6(13).
The 6ft 9in tall relied on his huge serves to win most of the points on them. The world number 11 bombarded 22 aces on Tipsarevic and converted 54 of the 59 first deliveries into points. The Florida, USA resident did not come across
even a single break threat in the entire match.
Isner is pitted against the reigning world number one, Roger Federer of Switzerland, in the quarter-finals. The Swiss Maestro downed Uzbekistan’s Denis Istomin in straight sets 7-5, 6-3 in the third round.
On playing Federer in the next match, Isner stated, “He’s the hottest guy on the tour, he’s back to No. 1 in the world. I’m going to have to serve well. I have to go for my shots. Anytime I get a ball I can hit, I’m going to have
to hit it big because I can’t rally with Roger. It’s as simple as that. If I try to get in rallies with him, he’s going to beat me.”
On the other hand, the Swiss star said, “We know he’s got one of the best serves on tour, if not the best. That obviously makes it complicated getting into rallies, into rhythm. That’s grass court tennis.”
From their previous four matches, Federer was winner in the first three but Isner triumphed in the last one.
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