Craft takes Muller through

The city’s tennis fans have always taken some time to warm up to each edition of the Aircel Chennai Open. The latter half of the tournament has always elicited a better turnout than the first, mostly due to the extra sprinkling of stardust. 

On day one of this year’s tournament, even the tennis seemed to mimic the crowd. The Gilles Muller-Edouard Roger-Vasselin match was subdued and had none of the laborious baseline rallies and constant ball-pounding that characterise today’s matches. There were 33 aces in all. The points were mostly short. It was all guile and craft as Muller beat the 2014 finalist 6-7(11), 6-1, 7-6(3) in 2 hours and 23 minutes. 

But then, like the tournament has done in recent years, the day too ended with a flourish with Croatia’s Borna Coric, full of adrenaline and power, demolishing Dutchman Robin Hasse 6-2, 6-2.

“I am surprised at how well I played in the first match of the year,” said the 18-year-old after the match. He will meet top seed Stan Wawrinka next.

In the first match, both Muller and Roger-Vasselin displayed a penchant to get closer to the net and shorten the rallies. The only phase which appeared to be a stretch was the first set tie-breaker — a long-drawn, 24-point affair — which Roger-Vasselin won.

“I was pretty passive in the first set,” said Muller. “Then I got more aggressive in the next two. For me it is crucial to find ways to finish off points at the net as I can’t rally with guys from the baseline.”

In the second set Muller took off. It was wrapped up in less than half an hour even as the other two tie-break sets spanned close to an hour each.

The Frenchman tried to regroup early in the third and even had an opening with Muller down 0-30 on his serve. However, some excellent serving — which he did consistently, dishing out 29 aces — bailed him out.

“Edouard is a great returner. I had to mix it up. I sliced, employed the kick-serve, hit some flat. I had to give him different balls to play,” said Muller.

Then, a break to 4-3 gave Roger-Vasselin another opportunity, but he squandered that too with Muller coming up with two remarkable returns — the twitch returns with minimal racquet swing — and two unforced errors on his part. 

From thereon, the set was had easily, on a tie-break to three points. “This is not a good start to the year,” said Roger-Vasselin. “Last year I reached the final and today I am out in the first round. I must admit the tactic of giving up the second set so that I could be ready for the third did not work.”

In the day’s other results, seventh-seeded Spaniard Marcel Granollers retired in the third set against Andreas Haider-Maurer due to a knee injury with him trailing 3-6, 7-6(6), 2-0.

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-sports/craft-takes-muller-through/article6758460.ece