Michael Llodra stuns Juan Martin Del Potro to reach last eight – BNP Paribas Masters 2012
French veteran, Michael Llodra, continued to shine at his home country event, as he surprised the seventh seed, Juan Martin Del Potro of Argentina, in straight sets 6-4, 6-3 in the third round of the BNP Paribas Masters in Paris.
This was Llodra’s second straight upset win, as he had defeated the 10th seeded American contender, John Isner, in the second round. The 32-year-old Frenchman is a doubles specialist but he has also played singles at
a very good level. The left-hander attained his career best ranking of 21 last year but now he is at the 121st position.
On the other hand, Del Potro was in top form lately, winning the Erste Bank Open in Vienna and Swiss Indoors Basel in the last two weeks. The Argentinean has already qualified for the ATP World Tour Finals and is being considered
one of the favourites to clinch the season ending championships.
Coming back to the third round encounter between Llodra and Del Potro at this ATP World Tour Masters 1000 indoor hard court event in Paris, both players held their serve in the first nine games to take the score to 5-4 in favour
of the Frenchman. Llodra applied pressure on the Argentinean at that moment and broke him to win the opening set 6-4.
Second set went with serve in the first seven games to take the score to 4-3 in favour of Llodra. The French national struck in the eighth and capitalised on the opportunity to claim it 6-3.
Commenting on his inspired run at this tournament, Llodra said, "Coming here I knew I was playing well. But now, thinking I would be able to beat [John] Isner and del Potro, I wasn't sure. It's true that the conditions are getting
faster, so I served very well today. Del Potro is a good returner, but he couldn't do anything because I served really well. When my favourite weapon works, then it's difficult to play against me."
Backed by the support of his home crowd, Llodra will face another surprise quarter-finalist, Sam Querrey of USA, to book his place in the semis.
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