Australian bad boy Bernard Tomic shrugged off his Miami arrest and banishment from the Davis Cup team to successfully defend his ATP Tour title in Bogota.
Tomic was accused of hitting “rock bottom” by Tennis Australia high performance chief Pat Rafter after being charged for resisting arrest and trespass in relation to a noisy hotel room party he hosted earlier this month.
However, the negative attention does not appear to have affected the controversial 22-year-old’s tennis.
Photo: AFP
He battled past Frenchman Adrian Mannarino 6-1, 3-6, 6-2 in Sunday’s final of the Claro Open to join Grigor Dimitrov and Milos Raonic as the only players born in the 1990s to win three ATP Tour titles.
“It’s been a very good year,” Tomic said on the ATP Web site. “I started at No. 70 [in the world rankings] and am now close to No. 20. It’s been a good seven months. I’ll try to play well the next three months and have the chance to be in the top 15.”
Tomic, whose ranking has improved to 25 from 29, was kicked out of the Davis Cup team after a tirade against Tennis Australia officials at Wimbledon.
Photo: AFP
Australia won their quarter-final tie against Kazakhstan without him, but want him back in the side for the semi-final against Britain in September.
Tennis Australia offered peace talks with Tomic to facilitate that, but he rejected the overture last week and said the feud would continue as long as the governing body declined to fund his sister’s development.
Sara Tomic plays mostly second-tier ITF tournaments, but Tennis Australia cut her funding, citing the uncooperative attitude of her father.
Bernard Tomic slammed the decision at Wimbledon and publicly criticized a number of Australian officials in an extraordinary outburst.
CROATIA OPEN
AP, UMAG, Croatia
Dominic Thiem of Austria beat Joao Sousa of Portugal 6-4, 6-1 to win the Croatia Open on Sunday.
Thiem became the first Austrian to win the title since Thomas Muster in 1995. After defeating top seed Gael Monfils of France in the semi-finals he stunned Sousa in just 61 minutes.
It was his second career title after victory in the Open de Nice in May in front of the watching world No. 1 Novak Djokovic.
“Today was [a] very special day. We were watched by world No. 1 Novak Djokovic,” Thiem said. “Usually he is the one who entertains us with great tennis and today we turned it around.”
“This tournament is really special for me. I played many times here as a junior and dreamed that one day I will be able to play here in full stadium at night,” he said.
Both players held serve until the seventh game of the first set, when a series of astonishing drop shots from Thiem eventually led to him breaking Sousa. He then won seven of the next eight games, with Sousa powerless to stop his opponent.
Thiem made only 11 unforced errors, compared with 26 by Sousa. Thiem hit 27 winners, Sousa 16.
The Austrian’s only low point came when he was serving for the match at 5-0. Three unforced errors saw him lose his serve, but by that point he had already established a comfortable lead and eventually closed out the match.
“I am very disappointed, but Dominic played very well today... he deserved to win,” Sousa said.
It was their third career meeting and Thiem now leads 3-0.
Djokovic, who is in Croatia on a vacation after winning the title at Wimbledon, also said Umag “holds a special place in my heart.”
He last played the tournament in 2006.
“I came in the name of all distant memories... now that I’m here as a spectator in a shirt, I’m starting to get nostalgic,” Djokovic said. “I’m drawn by the tennis, the racket is calling to me. Before I finish my career I’ll definitely come back and play another tournament in Umag.”
SWEDISH OPEN
AP, BASTAD, Sweden
Benoit Paire of France won his first ATP Tour title on Sunday after beating Spain’s Tommy Robredo 7-6 (9-7), 6-3 at the Swedish Open.
He beat the favorite, two-time champion after first saving two set points in the first-set tiebreak, which he eventually won in 56 minutes on a cool, blustery day.
The Frenchman broke Robredo’s serve to lead 4-2 in the second and after winning the next two games he secured his maiden title at Bastad.
“I wanted to try to play my game all the time. I said: ‘It’s windy today, but I have to stay focused and to be aggressive like I was during all the tournament,’” he said in an interview. “That’s why I think I won today... I wanted [the title] a lot.”
Paire reached the final after beating defending champion Pablo Cuevas 6-4, 6-3 on Saturday.
In the other semi-final, the 33-year-old Spaniard beat 18-year-old German Alexander Zverev 6-3, 6-4 and was looking for his third victory on his 15th appearance in Bastad, after winning in 2006 and 2008.
Paire was the first Frenchman to win the title since 1981.
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