Milos Raonic ousts Filippo Volandri in the opening round – Australian Open 2012
Booming star, Canada’s Milos Raonic, cruised past Italian competitor, Filippo Volandri, with a bagel at the Australian Open 2012 on Tuesday. He formulated a 6-4, 6-0, 6-2 victory over the 30-year-old Italian to book a spot in the round of 64 at this Grand Slam event, taking place on the hard courts in Melbourne, Australia.
23rd seed, Raonic, showed flawless performance on Court number 19 at the Melbourne Park and crushed the Italian, ranked 72nd in the South African Airways ATP (Association of Tennis Professionals) World Rankings, in almost one and half hour. Battling each other for the first time, the Canadian not only took lead in the head-to-head series by 1-0 against Volandri but also moved one step closer to bag 2000 ATP ranking points.
The Canadian youngster confidently entered the opening set and drew the first blood in the third game to eventually go 3-1 up. Later, he held remaining serves and pocketed the opener with a 6-4 win. Raonic hammered four winners and defended all five breakpoints he came across through his tremendous defensive skills.
The seed kept momentum flashing into the second set and unleashed barrage of groundstrokes to bag all six games in a row. He kept entire serves without facing any breakpoint and cashed in three out of four break chances to pocket a bagel in 21 minutes.
Raonic earned the coveted break in the opening game of the third set and took the initial lead. He maintained consistency in his game and kept remaining serves without facing any breakpoint. The Canadian broke Volandri’s serve again in the seventh game and sealed the set by winning six games to two.
The 2011’s ATP World Tour New Comer of the year, Raonic, is enjoying his career best rank at number 25 after lifting his second career title at the Aircel Chennai Open 2012. He upset second seed Nicolas Almagro in the semis and stunned top seed Janko Tipsarevic in the title-round. Last year, the Canadian made a fourth round showing through qualifiers at this major tennis tournament (lost to seventh seed David Ferrer).
The 21-year-old will next confront German challenger, Philipp Petzschner, who slew Czech Republic’s Lukas Rosol with double bagels to set-up this clash. The unseeded German lost his serve once but broke Rosol’s serve nine times, sealing the success with a 6-0, 6-0, 6-2 victory in 85 minutes. Petzschner also fired 10 aces and committed fewer unforced errors to overpower the Czech convincingly.
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