Lukas Lacko struggles past Andreas Vinciguerra in the opening round – IPP Open 2012 CH
World number 53, Lukas Lacko, had to dig deep before taking down the 31-year-old Swede veteran, Andreas Vinciguerra, in the opening round of the IPP Open tournament in Helsinki, Finland. The second seeded Polish contender took
one hour and 49 minutes to wrap up victory in three sets, settling the final score line at 3-6, 7-6(5), 6-4.
It was a thrilling contest between the two contenders, who were facing each other for the first time in their professional careers. The second seeded Pole stepped on the hard courts as the hot favourite for winning the battle but
suffered an early shocker at the hands of the 795th ranked opponent. Vinciguerra drew first blood and claimed the opening set with ease, building pressure on the superior-ranked rival. He broke Lacko in the fourth game and held on to his lead until
the conclusion of the set at 6-3.
Lacko had to labour extremely hard to recover in the following set and managed drag the set into a tie-breaker round after an exchange of break points from both ends. The second seeded Pole contestant reigned supreme in the tie-break
in the end, levelling the set score to one-all. He carried on with his winning momentum in the decisive set and broke Vinciguerra in the very first game. The Swede couldn’t recover from the early blow and kept lingering throughout the final set. Lacko comprehensively
serve out of the match at 5-4 and sealed a berth in the second round of the ATP Challenger Tour event.
Lacko delivered merely 55 per cent of his first serve on target but reeled off 41 out of 55 points on it. He banged 10 thudding aces in the match and broke his opponent two out of two times en route to victory. On the other hand,
Vinciguerra managed to bag 49 out of 62 first serve points, along with nine cracking aces, but his performance deteriorated significantly in the third set. He couldn’t carry on with his winning impetus in the decider and had to pay the price in the end.
Lacko will face Uladzimir Ignatik in his next matchup later this week.
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