ALMAGRO VS GOFFIN

Rafael Nadal’s countryman, Nicolas Almagro, will lock horns with David Goffin of Belgium in the third round of the Sony Open on Monday. This will be the second time that he will be facing Goffin.

These two players had faced each other in the Sony Open last year as well. In that match, Almagro had demolished Goffin and had secured a straight set win.

This year hasn’t been that good for Almagro. He has played well at times, but, he has not been consistent. His first tournament in the season was Mubadala World Tennis Championship. He performed quite well in that tournament and reached the title round where he was defeated by Novak Djokovic in three sets.

After that tournament, Almagro participated in the Australian Open and reached the quarter finals there. In the quarter final, he was playing against his countryman David Ferrer. He had a fabulous start in that match and he won the first couple of sets. But, after that, he lost the plot and ended up being defeated.

After the Australian Open, Almagro started struggling with his form and in the tournaments that he played after that, he didn’t manage to put up impressive performances.

Almagro has played 18 matches in the ongoing season out of which he has won 13 and lost 5.

On the other hand, Almagro’s opponent Goffin is only 22 years of age and he is currently at no. 47 in the world rankings. He has had an extremely poor run this year so far. He has been defeated in 8 out of the 13 matches that he has played this year. However, he is a promising young player and he has the capability of pulling off upsets. So, Almagro will have to be careful against him.

ALMAGRO BETAS TIPSAREVIC

Rafael Nadal’s countryman, Nicolas Almagro, has defeated Janko Tipsarevic of Serbia in a match of the Mubadala Tennis Championship on Friday. Almagro won the match by 2-6, 7-6, 6-2.

This was the first match for Almagro in this tournament. He was given a bye in the opening round, so, he started his campaign by directly playing in the semi final match.

Almagro was not looking in great touch at the start of the match and he played a lot of loose shots in the opening set. But, as the match went on, he slowly got into his rhythm and eventually came out victorious. He took one hour and 48 minutes to win the match.

In the first set, Tipsarevic was in fine form. He broke Almagro’s service in the very first game and didn’t let the Spaniard make a comeback after that. He sealed the first set easily by 6-2.

In the second set, neither of the two players managed to get a breakthrough in the first 11 games and at the end of the 11^th game, the score was 6-5 in the favour of Almagro. In the 12^th game, Almagro got a couple of breakpoints, but, he didn’t manage to capitalize on them and the set went into the tie breaker.

However, in the tie breaker, Almagro didn’t waste the opportunities. He got a mini break early and after that, he didn’t look back. He won the tie breaker easily and came back into the match.

In the final set, Almagro was at his very best. He started with a breakthrough in the first game and enhanced that lead with a serve hold in the next game. He got one more breakthrough towards the end of the set.

At the end of the seventh game, Almagro was ahead by 5-2. Tipsarevic needed to break Almagro’s service at least a couple of times to come back into the match, but, he failed in doing so. Almagro easily served out the 8^th game and finished off the match.

In the final, Almagro will take on the world no. 1 Novak Djokovic.