Ricardo Mello breezes past Ivan Navarro into final eight – BVA Open 2011 CH
Spanish, Ivan Navarro, squared-off against Brazilian, Ricardo Mello, after eight years, in the second round of BVA Open Challenger tournament, contested in Brazil, on Thursday October 27th. It was the easiest of the
victories for the sixth seed, Mello, who confirmed his quarter-final place with a straight set 6-1, 6-4 win in just over an hour and forty-minutes.
The arena was jam packed with spectators who were eager to see their local hero in action again. Both players were enjoying an excellent run of form and were winning throughout their last six encounters and were looking to extend
their winning streak with this victory.
Brazilian obviously had the advantage of home crowd and superior rank but given the preceding head-to-head results of one match win apiece depicted an enthralling battle. Campinas born had some other intentions and his performance
at the court clearly showed his capabilities.
30-year-old Spanish had an impressive start and smashed two back-to-back aces in the second set but the response from his opponent was ravishing. Mello didn’t allowed his competitor to win a single game from there onwards and hammered
him all over the place with his smashing serves and beautifully placed backhand and forehand shots.
Brazilian won five opportunities to break his opponent serve and succeeded in breaking on two of them. Navarro was totally dismantled and his confidence was shattered. The roar from the crowd on every successful point of their
local boy was also putting him under a lot of pressure.
Total points played in the first set were forty-seven and 62% of those were won by Mello that shows her dominance throughout the set. The disillusioned look on the face on the Spanish told the whole story.
The second set was relatively competent but still not good enough to stretch the match into the finale. Navarro took 3-0 lead initially by breaking his opponent’s serve in the second game but he couldn’t followed it up with any
more breaks.
The reply from the home boy was scintillating as he hammered the Spanish on his serves and broke twice to level things at three games apiece. Spanish could only clinch one more game before Mello finished it off in great fashion.
He spared no opportunity to thump his opponent; it was the test of mental toughness for the Spanish who failed it.
Brazilian won 65 out of 116 points played in the match and registered an impressive overall first and second serve percentage of 71% and 52% respectively. Five aces are the only positive that the Spanish could take from this match.
Ricardo Mello has now comfortably placed himself in the last eight of the tournament and will lock horns with Spanish, Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo in his next encounter.
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