Former champion Milos Raonic yesterday lost in straight sets to 18-year-old Alex De Minaur in a second-round upset at the Brisbane International.
Raonic, who won the Brisbane title in 2016 and reached the final at Wimbledon that year, struggled to find rhythm with his usually booming serve in a 6-4, 6-4 loss to the Australian wild-card entry.
De Minaur pressured Raonic with his relentless service returns, made just one unforced error and only dropped serve once — when serving for the match at 5-2 — en route to the biggest win of his career.
Photo: EPA-EFE
The victory put De Minaur into a quarter-final match against American qualifier Michael Mmoh, who upset eighth-seeded Mischa Zverev 6-2, 5-7, 6-4.
Raonic was playing his first match since October last year after taking time out to deal with injuries that also ruled him out of the US Open, with his ranking slipping to No. 24 — 21 spots lower than his career-high finish in 2016.
“Heavily disappointed,” Raonic said. “I could have served better. I could have moved a little better. I could have found my way to the net a little bit better.”
“I sort of played into his comfort zone. I didn’t do enough to pull him out of it or, when I did, it would be only for a few points at a time. I wasn’t consistent enough and that’s sort of what cost me,” he added.
Raonic saved double break points in his first two service games in the second set, but was finally broken in the fifth game when De Minaur challenged a call on a second serve, got it overturned to win the point on a double-fault and won the next two points on the back of some impressive returns.
De Minaur broke again in the seventh game and, after missing the chance to close out in the eighth, the former Wimbledon junior finalist held his composure to close out.
Asked how he unsettled one of the better servers in tennis, De Minaur said he threw out the playbook.
“I was just guessing really, I’m not going to lie,” De Minaur said. “I tried to change my returning position a bit to try to throw him off a bit. He probably didn’t have his best serving day, which helped me a lot. I took advantage of it — really proud.”
Nick Kyrgios was the first into the men’s quarter-finals, overcoming a knee problem to outlast fellow Australian Matthew Ebden 6-7 (3/7), 7-6 (7/5), 6-2.
Third-seeded Kyrgios called for a medical timeout after nine games and had further treatment two games later to have his left knee taped.
His movement appeared to be hampered, but he still had too much for Ebden and set up a quarter-final match against former Brisbane International runner-up Alexandr Dolgopolov, who beat Horacio Zeballos 6-1, 6-2.
In the women’s singles, Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina continued her impressive start to the season by demolishing Croatian Ana Konjuh 6-3, 6-1 in the second round.
Svitolina took just 64 minutes to see off Konjuh at the Pat Rafter Arena and book an enticing quarter-final showdown with Britain’s Johanna Konta.
She was joined in the final eight by defending champion and second seed Karolina Pliskova, who took 10 minutes less to demolish American Catherine Bellis 6-1, 6-1.
Svitolina, 23, started the week as world No. 6, but would finish it as No. 4 if she wins the tournament.
She won five tournaments last year and goes into the Australian Open as a serious contender for the year’s first Grand Slam.
She had a tough opening-round win over Spain’s Carla Suarez Navarro, but was relatively untroubled against world No. 44 Konjuh.
“I’m playing well and I’m happy that I’m showing good tennis from the start of the year,” Svitolina said. “I try to always find my good tennis out there and, you know, play well. That’s the most important thing.”
Estonia’s Kaia Kanepi, the 2012 champion, moved into the last eight with a 6-4, 6-3 win over Ukraine’s Lesia Tsurenko.
Once ranked as high as 15th in the world, Kanepi is on the comeback trail after an injury forced her out of the game in June 2016 for just more than a year.
She reached last year’s US Open as a qualifier and had to qualify in Brisbane as well.
However, her powerful serve proved too much for Tsurenko and she is now to face Pliskova in the quarter-finals.
Belarussian qualifier Aliaksandra Sasnovich booked a quarter-final against Frenchwoman Alize Cornet when she beat Estonia’s Anett Kontaveit 1-6, 7-6 (7/2), 6-3.
SS Lazio on Monday fired the far-right sympathizer who handles their eagle mascot after he posted online a series of videos and pictures of his erect penis. Falconer Juan Bernabe, who has been present at Lazio home matches with Olimpia the eagle since the 2010-2011 season, posted the footage on social media after having surgery on Saturday to implant a penile prosthesis to improve his sexual performance. Lazio said that they had “terminated, with immediate effect” their relationship with Bernabe “due to the seriousness of his conduct,” adding that they were “shocked” by the images. The Serie A club added that Bernabe’s dismissal
Hong Kong-based cricket team Hung See this weekend found success in their matches in Taiwan, even if none of the results went their way. Hung See played the Chairman’s XI on Saturday morning, the Daredevils that afternoon and PCCT yesterday, with all three home teams winning. The team for Chinese players at the Happy Valley-based Craigengower Cricket Club sends teams on tour to “spread the game of cricket.” This weekend was Hung See’s second trip to Taiwan after visiting Tainan in 2016. “The club has been traveling to all parts of the world since 1982 and the annual tradition continues [with the Taiwan
‘TOUGH TO BREATHE’: Tunisian three-time Grand Slam finalist Ons Jabeur suffered an asthma attack in her 7-5, 6-3 victory over Colombia’s Camila Osorio Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei yesterday cruised into the second round of the women’s doubles at the Australian Open, while Iga Swiatek romped into a third-round women’s singles showdown with Emma Raducanu and Taylor Fritz was just as emphatic in his pursuit of a maiden Grand Slam title. Hsieh and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia, the third seeds, defeated Slovakia’s Tereza Mihalikova and Olivia Nicholls of Britain 7-5, 6-2 in 90 minutes in Melbourne. Ostapenko and Hsieh — who won the women’s doubles and mixed doubles at the Australian Open last year — hit 25 winners and converted five of nine break points to set
HARD TO SAY GOODBYE: After Coco Gauff dispatched Belinda Bencic in the fourth round, she wrote ‘RIP TikTok USA’ and drew a broken heart on a television camera lens Defending champion Hsieh Su-wei of Taiwan yesterday advanced to the quarter-finals of the women’s doubles at the Australian Open, while compatriot Chan Hao-ching on Saturday dominated her opponents in the second round, as world No. 1 Aryna Sabalenka swept into the quarter-finals. Third seeds Hsieh and Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia toppled Hungary’s Timea Babos and Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the US 6-4, 6-3, hitting 24 winners and converting three of seven break points in 1 hour, 18 minutes at 1573 Arena. Although rivals at last year’s Australian Open — where Hsieh and Belgium’s Elise Mertens beat Ostapenko and Ukraine’s Lyudmyla Kichenok 6-1, 7-5
RSS