Marin Cilic ends Ryan Harrison’s voyage in the opening round – US Open 2011
Dismay for the local crowd, as the American wildcard, Ryan Harrison, crashed out of the US Open in the opening round, falling to Croatia’s number one, Marin Cilic, on Monday afternoon.
The contest was staged at the Louis Armstrong Stadium of the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows Park, of Queens, New York City, United States, with the 27th seeded Croat finishing off the
matchup in straight sets 6-2, 7-5, 7-6(6).
28th ranked Cilic took two hours twenty six minutes of play to drive Harrison out of the last Grand Slam tournament of the current year with the utmost ease. The Croat coughed 41 unforced errors in the contest but his
39 cracking winner very well compensated for it, as he concluded a straight sets victory to reach the second round of the tournament.
The American was off to a sloppy start in the opening set and dropped the first set without posing any real resistance to the belligerent Croat opponent. He gathered up some pace in the following two sets but lost them both after
a close competition with Cilic to end up his voyage at the US Open.
“It’s obviously pretty disappointing to be out of here when half the people haven’t even arrived yet with the hurricane,” the 19-year-old American expressed after losing to Cilic. “I felt terrible from the first point till the
last point the way I was hitting the ball. So to think that I served for two sets against a guy who is such an established player as him, there are a lot of positives I can take from it.”
Cilic fully capitalized upon his opponent’s early mistakes in the contest and eased out his way to victory with his aggressive game play. He converted seven out of his nine break opportunities en route to victory, while Harrison
cashed in four out of seven break points to finish on the losing side in the end.
“A few times I felt like that because he was there playing well and he breaks me and then just loses his serve on love,” Cilic said of Harrison. “Those kinds of things you learn through the years.”
The Croat will take on the 60th ranked Australian, Bernard Tomic, in the second round of the tournament. The Aussie was successful against the other American qualifier, Michael Yani, in straight sets 6-3, 6-4, 6-4, in
the opening round.
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