Rui Machado battles past Martin Alund into final four – BVA Open 2011 CH
Top seed, Rui Machado, of Portugal faced severe resistance from Argentine, Martin Alund, in the quarter-final of BVA Open Challenger tournament, played in Brazil, on Friday October 28th. Portuguese, World No.80, won
the match in an epic three-setter that lasted for almost two hours and thirty-two minutes with a final score of 3-6, 7-6(5), 6-2.
Alund had lost two whilst his opponent had lost three of their last nine encounters so apparently both were enjoying a good run of form. Sizeable crowd had gathered to witness this epic encounter and they were not disappointed
at all.
It was a surprising start to the match as World No.288, Alund, started to dominate the match. He kicked-off the proceedings with two back-to-back aces and broke his opponent’s serve to take a 3-0 lead upfront.
In the next two games both opponent’s exchanged breaks and score rushed to 4-1 and from there both held on to their serves and set ended in the favour of Argentine who looked promising throughout the set. He smashed seven more
aces on different occasions whilst his opponent couldn’t manage to score a single one.
25-year-old Argentine pocketed 42 points and secured the set by winning 55% of the total points. The game was open and everyone hinted an epic three-setter as the top seed was not going to lose it so easily.
The power play from the Argentine continued in the second set as well and he smashed two back to back aces on two separate occasions. But this time it was much more improved performance from the 27-year-old Portuguese who held
on to his serves on five of the six occasions.
The see-saw score line continued for the first six sets and in the next two players again exchanged breaks to keep it on equal terms and further pushed the score to six games apiece in the four games.
Alund did a major blunder in the tiebreaker as he double-faulted giving the advantage to the top seed who didn’t wasted that opportunity at all and capitalized with a perfect backhand shot at the far corner where Alund could only
see the ball sail past him but could do nothing about it.
The length of the match tired both the players and now it was all about stamina and Machado was well experienced with such scenarios and utilized his energy to the best of its use.
He used his drop shots and corner to corner game play to drain his opponent’s stamina. Alund was completely dehydrated and his moves were limited by his body condition. Machado took complete advantage of this scenario and thumped
him hard on his serves and registered an easy victory in the third set.
Top seed has now comfortably placed himself in the semis against the Argentine Eduardo Schwank.
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