SA Tennis Open: Rik de Voest defeats Stefano Galvani in three-set thriller
Wild card entrant Rik De Voest of the Republic of South Africa defeated qualifier Stefano Galvani of Italy in a thrilling 3-set encounter at the 2011 SA Tennis open in Johannesburg. The match ended with a scoreline of 6-3, 5-7
and 7-6 on Tuesday.
It was an exciting battle to watch for the crowd that was backing up the local tennis player, De Voest. The dogfight between the two veterans first swung one way and then the other, but in the end, the 183rd ranked South
African came out on top. Despite the disparity in their rankings, the 321st ranked Italian opponent pushed Rik to the limits. The 33-year-old Galvani dragged the third set into a lengthy tiebreaker, forcing De Voest to pull out all his guns.
The first set was easily won by De Voest. His opponent was slow off the start-line, and he took full advantage of the situation. The 30-year-old Rik served well, landing in 64 per cent of his first serves, compared to Galvani’s
56 per cent. Moreover, De Voest won 64 per cent of the points off his own serve, while Stefano was much worse, as he won only 54 per cent of the points off his first serve. De Voest broke Galvani’s serve twice to take the set 6-3.
The following set was a tight affair. De Voest’s first serve percentage dropped down to almost 41 per cent, and while Galvani’s did too, it dropped only to 44 per cent. Unlike the first set, Galvani won more points on his first
serve, 80 per cent, as compared to the South African’s 76 per cent. He also saved two break points, and produced four for himself. Stefano availed one of these opportunities, breaking in the 11th game of the set to go up 5-6. He then served the
set out.
In the third set, both the players left no stone unturned. Galvani kept up the hard work, landing a majority of his first serves in his opponent’s service box. 64 per cent of his serves were legal, while De Voest could only manage
55 per cent. However, De Voest did win a higher percentage of points off his first serve, 70 per cent, as compared to Galvani’s 62. Both players managed one break each in the set, thus the match headed into a tiebreaker. Both players kept each other on their
toes, and it was at 8-8 that De Voest finally broke free to clinch the deciding set, 10-8.
Despite meeting for the first time, the duo matched each other very well and put up an enthralling performance. One can only hope that the other matches in this year’s SA Tennis Open are as exciting as this one. In the next round,
De Voest will face either eighth seed, Michal Przysiezny or his current opponent, Martin Fischer.
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