Robin Soderling wins Open 13 Tournament in Marseille
World number four Robin Soderling continued his convincing run at the ATP World Tour as he bagged his third title of 2011, beating Marin Cilic of Croatia in the final of Open 13 in three sets.
The Swede looked in some pain after the first set but made an amazing comeback to earn the Open 13 tournament title- an ATP Tour 250 series tournament held annually in Marseille.
Both players exchanged breaks during the first set but the Swede looked extremely out of sorts, unable to execute his shots to perfection. The top seed eventually lost the first set in the tiebreaker after saving four set points.
Soderling then looked a bit settled in the second set, breaking his opponent’s serve twice to level the set score 1-1. In the third set, the Swede dominated his opponent and won the match comfortably. The final score line was 6-7, 6-3, 6-3.
After his hard-fought win, Soderling said, “I have to congratulate Marin Cilic. He played very well and he was really impressive in the first set. He was very aggressive and played really. I'm very proud to have started to play better in the second set instead
of starting to play worse after losing the tie-break.”
Martin Cilic on the other hand struggled to capitalise on the psychological advantage he had after he was leading the match in the start. He made a number of unforced errors in the second and third sets which cost him in the end.
Robin Soderling, who has now won 17 out of 18 matches and 3 ATP Tour titles in 2011 added, “Winning three tournaments in less than two months is a very nice feeling, it's the best start to a season possible.”
The Swede’s only loss of the year came at the Australian Open when he was defeated by unseeded Alexandr Dolgopolov in five sets. Apart from that, it has been a dream season for the Swede so far. He is certainly playing his best tennis and looks in great
shape to take on the likes of Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic in the rest of the season.
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