Mardy Fish battles past Carlos Berlocq in the second round- Western and Southern Open 2012
Tenth seeded American, Mardy Fish, rallied into the third round of the Western and Southern Open in Cincinnati after defeating the Argentinean, Carlos Berlocq, by a straight sets score of 6-3, 6-1. The American veteran was
twice the runner-up at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 hard court championship, in the year 2003 and 2010 respectively, but couldn’t perform well in this year’s edition.
Fish told the media in a post match interview, “I felt like I played as well today as I have all summer. This person is a good player, really good player. If you are not on top of your game, you are going to be in a lot of
trouble. I could still be out there, no doubt, and he could beat me. I felt like I was in control the entire match. That's satisfying, for sure.”
The US professional showed a brilliant display to open the set with 1-0. He clenched his 3-0 lead very tactfully until the fourth game from where the Argentinean gained momentum. The first set witnessed consecutive breakpoints,
with Berlocq tried to equalize the scores but Fish secured two more games and jolted a 6-3 score line to claim of the opening set.
The former world number seven, Fish, served fiercely throughout the set and banged his rival with five aces and just committing no double fault. However, Berlocq just managed to pull off one ace in the entire match and unexpectedly
made several blunders, such as five double faults at the critical points.
Currently ranked 20th in the ATP World Tour Rankings, Fish converted 10 of 13 first serve points and eight of 13 second deliveries. The 29-year-old could not perform as expected and just managed to
pocket eight of 17 first and four of five second serve points in the opening set.
In the second half of the match, the 45th ranked Argentinean repeated the same pattern. Fish won the first serve of the match and created a 1-0 lead. His scores exhibited a transcending pattern in
every game of the second set. Fish clinched seven of nine points in the first and eight of 13 deliveries into points in the second. The Argentinean scored seven of 15 in the first and three of 11 points in the second serve respectively.
The 30-year-old, Fish is drawn against Radek Stepanek in the third round.
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