Mikhail Youzhny defeats Carlos Berlocq to reach third round – German Tennis Championships 2011
Fourth seed Mikhail Youzhny, currently ranked at No. 17 triumphed 7-5, 7-6 (9-7) to oust Carlos Berlocq, from Argentina in a swiftly manoeuvred two straight set victory. The Russian Youzhny had earlier received a bye to the second round of the bet-at-home Open German Tennis Championships 2011 and is now safely secured in the top 16 round of the tournament.
Youzhny returned to the court following a 7-6(6), 2-6, 2-6 defeat to Juan Carlos Ferrero in Stuttgart last week. With this win, the 29 year old Youzhny has successfully pulled through his streak of four consecutive opening round losses at Hamburg and his mark this year stands at an impressive 15-14. His opponent, the Argentinean Berlocq is currently ranked at No. 80 in the singles ranking and has secured 10 tour level wins this season. Berlocq came through to the second round by dismissing Robin Haase of Netherlands in an unassailable 6-2, 6-2 win.
This match was the players’ first meeting and lasted for an agonizing two hours and nineteen minutes.
The match started with Youzhny serving the first game. The first few games of the opening set saw evenly matched performance on both the players’ part. Berlocq and Youzhny each managed to register a single breakpoint in games 2 and 5. The closely contested set built up to the 5-5 mark at an excruciatingly slow pace before Berlocq finished the game by registering another break of serve. Berlocq scored 18 service points and 9 return points for a total of 27 points but these shied in comparison to Youzhny’s 37 points. He had scored 21 service points and 16 return points. Berlocq also managed to race two aces past his opponent but these proved insufficient as the tiring set finally ended at 7-5 in Youzhny’s favour.
The second set followed precedent set by the first set and remained as closely contested as possible. The game could have gone either war till the very end. Both the players outperformed themselves, especially while serving as Youzhny secured a massive 5 aces and Berlocq too followed closely by accumulating 3. However, it was Berlocq’s inability to impose on his opponent a single successfully executed breakpoint that eventually cost him the set and the match. It would however be unfair to not mention Berlocq’s superb skill in successfully blocking all four of the breakpoint situations that he faced. The game dragged on with the scores eventually settling at 6-6 and the game moved into a tiebreaker. Youzhny eventually powered through in the thrilling tiebreaker by grabbing 9 points against Berlocq’s 7.
Youzhny will now square off against wild card Julian Reister to battle for a place in the quarterfinals.
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