SA Tennis Open, De Voest beats 8th seed to reach quarterfinals
Rik De Voest, wild card and local hero, sent 8th seeded Pole, Michal Przysiezny, packing in the second round of the SA Tennis Open in Johannesburg.
In a straight forward two set victory, De Voest showed some master class as he bundled off an opponent ranked much higher than him.
The South African, ranked a hundred and two places beneath the Pole’s 81, used his greater experience on the circuit and support of his home fans to crush the younger and sprightlier player 6-3, 6-4.
Przysiezny is but the latest of highly ranked, highly seeded players to be knocked out of this tournament. Other casualties include Feliciano Lopez, the Spanish first seed, Yen-Hsun Lu, the Chinese second seed and Janko Tipsarevic, the Serbian third seed.
In fact, the only top seed that performed at the level expected was South Africa’s very own 4th seed, Kevin Anderson. Along with Anderson and a few others, De Voest is representing his nation at his home tournament, and they are all doing really
well so far.
The first set was something of a breeze for De Voest. Despite not serving well, he emerged the victor. Przysiezny had 56 per cent of his first serves in, and he converted 67 per cent of those serves into points.
De Voest on the other hand, only landed 44 per cent of his first serves right. His conversion rate of first serves to points was much higher than his opponents though.
With 91 per cent of his first serves resulting in points, he gained the same number of points from serve as the Pole did, 10 each.
The African was much more effective on the return, especially on the second serve. Winning 58 per cent of his second service returns, he created 3 break chances. Availing one of them, he progressed to a 6-3 lead, resulting in an easy first set victory.
The second set was more or less a repeat of the first one. Continuing the mellow character of the match, both players converted nearly the same amount of first serves into points, 70 for the European, 72 for the South African.
This time, however, the higher seed served terribly. Since he only got in a measly 38 per cent of his first serves right, he gained only 7 points. His opponent gained 18, due to a much higher, 60 per cent of legal first serves. A superior return game was
not enough for Michal to survive, and conceding two breaks while gaining one led him to lose the second set as well, 6-4.
South Africa’s hopes have certainly been raised by the performances of De Voest and his compatriots, and it is indeed likely that the SA Tennis Open shall see a home grown victor this time. What remains to be seen though is whether it would be De Voest or
someone else.
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