Marcos Baghdatis struggles past Michael Lammer into last eight – Swiss Indoor Basel 2011
In an enthralling second round clash of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors Basel, the world number 59, Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus, had some tough time before taking down the local qualifier, Michael Lammer, on Wednesday evening.
Being played on the indoor hard courts of the St. Jakobshalle in Basel, Switzerland, the contest took two hours and forty minutes to conclude. Baghdatis earned a hard-fought victory in three sets, 7-6(2), 6-7(2), 6-3, to make a berth in the quarter-final draw of the ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) World Tour 500 event.
The unseeded Cypriot faced some serious resistance from Lammer in the opening two sets of the match but held his nerve in the pressure situations to come out as the winner in the end. Baghdatis took the first set in a tie breaker round to get one up early but the Swiss competitor returned the favour in the second set to bring him down on even terms once again. Baghdatis nailed the only serve break of the match in the third set to turn the tables on the Swiss qualifier and registered his 28th victory of the running season.
The contest remained evenly poised throughout, with no serve breaks registered from the contestants in the opening two sets. Despite of a below par serve precision of merely 47 per cent, Baghdatis reeled off 44 out of 55 first serve points in the matchup, with Lammer closely following him with 40 out of his 50 points. The Swiss Qualifier crafted four break opportunities in the matchup but has denied every single time by the brilliance of Baghdatis in the contest.
Intense tennis was witnessed from both sides right from the beginning. The two contestants toiled extremely hard to take the early advantage in the matchup but none them succeeded in breaking the opponent’s serve. The first two sets were split between the two men in tie breaker rounds but Baghdatis finally broke in the second game of the final set to lead 3-0 and then held his advantage till the conclusion of the match at 6-3.
Baghdatis will either take on the world number one, Novak Djokovic of Serbia, or the Pole qualifier, Lukasz Kubot, in the quarter-final rounds to fight for a berth in the semis of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors Basel. The top seed Serbian and Kubot will compete against each other on Thursday evening and the winner will take on Baghdatis in the quarter-finals of the tournament.
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