Santiago Giraldo blazes past Dmitry Tursunov into quarterfinal – Rakuten Open 2011
Santiago Giraldo, Columbian world No.53, bombarded higher ranked Russian, world No. 40, Dmitry Tursunov on Thursday, 6th October, as they fought out in the 2nd round match of the Rakuten Open 2011. Playing
on blue hard court at Ariake Coliseum, Tokyo, Japan, the 23-year-old magnified his performance ousting Tursunov 6-4, 7-6(4) in almost 2 hours to runaway into the quarter-finals.
Although the Russian had a higher ranking, world No.40, than the Columbian he still could not hold off to the agile Columbian. Giraldo did stun the stands as well as the higher ranked Russian with his accuracy and sheer power.
With the warm up finishing off, Tursunov won the service toss and served first to open the first game of the match. However, the start of the match was as fast as it could get. Breaking the 28-year-old, Giraldo struck early and
took the lead, 1-0.
Although Giraldo had a superb first game, the 23-year-old fell short as he served and gave away a breakpoint, 1-1. Nevertheless, the world N0.53 did strike back instantly as he broke the third game on the Russian’s serve and took
the lead 2-1.
Serving out game 4 the Columbian extended his lead to 3-1 and switched back the serve. Winning on his serve, 2-3, Tursunov aimed to break the world No.53, however, was unable to break. While the Russian seemed frustrated, Giraldo
added to that as he kept on extending his lead keeping a perfect defence simultaneously.
Failing to break till the end of the set, Tursunov eventually lost the first set, 4-6 and moved on hoping to level back the match scores to level in the next set.
With set 2 starting off shortly, Tursunov built up a stronger defence, not letting the 23-year-old to break him throughout. Serving out game 1, the world No.40 switched the serve back to his counterpart. Levelling up in no time,
Giraldo won game 2 and attempted to break the higher ranked Russian in game 3, however, saving the breakpoint, Tursunov led the set 2-1.
Giraldo kept on winning games on his serve which led to the set locking up in a tiebreaker decider game. Serving first, Tursunov levelled up at the start, however, Giraldo broke the world No.40 once to lead and eventually finished
off, 7-4, winning the set, 7-6(4) and the match in straight sets.
Upsetting the world No.40, Giraldo now moves on to the third round, quarter-final, of the 2011 Rakuten Open to play against the top seeded Spaniard bull, Rafael Nadal.
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