Modern-day tennis great from Switzerland, Roger Federer’s return to professional tennis after two months did not get off to a flying start on his pre-French Open warm-up on clay. He lost to Spain’s Pablo Andujar in a three-setter 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 in the pre-quarters of the Geneva Open 2021 at Tennis Club de Genèven on Tuesday.
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Federer had a tough time dealing with Andujar’s serve, followed by his strong resilience, as the latter even countered the former’s famous forehands from the side baseline. While a break in the opening two sets was enough to take the game to the deciding set, despite trailing by a break in the decider, the Spaniard earned twin breaks to bounce back and cause the upset.
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“As number one, for sure. To win a tournament could be more emotional, but this is something I think I will remember my whole life. Of course, he’s much better than me and if he plays a match, he would beat me for sure. But I don’t think he played a really bad match. That’s my point of view. I think in some of the points, in some of the facets of the match, he played pretty well. I couldn’t return his serve; his first stroke after the serve is always very good. During the match, there were some good points,” said Andujar after the win.
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“Of course, at 4-2 in the third, you feel like, ‘Oh, that’s nice that I was able to turn around the match.’ You start feeling better and that’s when it dips, and everything is over 10 minutes later. But, we know how tennis goes and that’s where it’s so brutal sometimes. But I feel like I didn’t deserve it at the end. There was just not enough happening in my game,” said Federer following the defeat.
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Meanwhile, fellow tennis great Serena Williams of the United States of America also suffered a similar harsh fate. She was ousted in the same round of the Parma Challenger 2021 at the Tennis Club President on Wednesday to Czech Republic’s Katerina Siniakova in straight sets (7-6[4], 6-2).
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Siniakova saved a set point in the opening set to take it to the tie-breaker, where she intended on playing the ball away from Serena, thus tiring her out. Consequently, the American seemingly did not have much to fight for and played casual tennis, while the Czech just outplayed her with a couple of breaks.
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“Not every day is really amazing. If you go to play against a player like this, you really have nothing to lose, so I came up and wanted to enjoy it. I didn’t do a lot of mistakes, and I think she felt it. I think she was trying to go harder and doing a lot of mistakes, which helped me - I’m really happy I could keep my level all match,” Siniakova said, following her win.NOTE: Asianet News humbly requests everyone to wear masks, sanitise, maintain social distancing and get vaccinated as soon as eligible. Together we can and will break the chain #ANCares #IndiaFightsCorona
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