Top Seed Capdeville opens LG&T Tennis Challenger with win

By JEFFREY DUNHAM
Aug 4, 10:04 pm EDT

Chilean top seed Paul Capdeville, fresh off a first round loss at the ATP Masters Series Cincinnati last week, defeated Slovenian qualifier Luka Gregorc 6-3, 6-2 in first round play at the LG&T Tennis Challenger today. Capdeville's experience playing in big matches on the ATP Tour surely played a factor in his relatively comfortable win. While not displaying the racquet head speed of Roger Federer or Rafael Nadal, Capdeville showed that he possesses a varied arsenal of consistent and fluid strokes.

The first set began at approximately 5:40 pm in front of a large Recreation Park crowd. Capdeville got the break with Gregorc serving at 2-3 in the first set on Gregorc's forehand error. In the following game, Capdeville nearly surrendered his break advantage on a double fault, but he eventually regained his composure and served out the game to go up 5-2. After getting down 0-30 while serving at 5-3, Capdeville won the first set on a Gregorc backhand that sailed long.

After holding serve to start the second set, Gregorc set up break point with a backhand passing shot down the line, but he could not convert. Capdeville ended up forcing two breaks of serve in the second set, essentially sealing Gregorc's fate. Gregorc nearly got one of the breaks back with Capdeville serving for the match and down 0-40. However, Capdeville's experience showed when he climbed out of that game and closed out the match at 6-2.

When asked if his experience in matches against top ten players, including Roger Federer and James Blake, possibly played a role in his success at the Challenger level, Capdeville indicated that the competition was tough at all levels, but that opponents here "sometimes hit the ball too high."

The evening's second high-profile match was between two Americans, the Russian-born Alex Kuznetsov and former University of Kentucky standout Jesse Witten. This match actually began one half hour before the Capdeville match and finished about forty-five minutes after that match ended. This was a vocal and tense match, with a few primal screams, code violations for ball abuse, and disputed line calls.

Kuznetsov easily won the first set on a slew of errors from Witten, but Witten rebounded in the second set to win a tiebreak after the players exchanged breaks of serve. In the third set, Witten appeared to have put Kuznetsov away after going up two breaks, but Kuznetsov got one break back and Witten double-faulted before missing an easy volley to allow Kuznetsov to level it at 5-5. Kuznetsov took the lead to hold serve for 6-5 in the third set and he appeared to have the momentum. In Witten's next service game, the players exchanged a series of bludgeoning forehands, with the inevitable tiebreak being the result. The tiebreak ended in anticlimactic fashion with Witten quickly going up 6-0 and securing the win when Kuznetsov dumped an overhead into the bottom of the net. Witten won this tense marathon 1-6, 7-6(4), 7-6(0).

In other action, Slovakian No. 5 seed and 2006 finalist Lukas Lacko defeated unseeded Jamie Baker from Great Britain 6-4, 7-5. This proved to be another hard-hitting battle, with Lacko proving the slightly more consistent player in the end. Baker repeatedly hit flat, down-the-line forehands with remarkable pace. Lacko proved that he was up to the task in sending most of these shots back in the same manner.

Unseeded Matwe Middlekoop from the Netherlands entertained the crowd with his obvious sense of humor in the face of great frustration, going down to Australia's Nick Lindahl 6-4, 3-6, 6-7(3). Middlekoop even found it within himself to high-five one of the ball kids after a particularly frustrating point.

Finally, local favorites Billy Mendler and Kris Shumway proved too aggressive and precise for the duo of Victor Romero and Aleksey Vayner, qualifying for the main draw in this year's doubles.

Tuesday's evening match will feature Lithuanian wildcard and ITF Junior World No. 3 Ricardas Berankis vs. Todd Widom of the USA. Berankis is a star on the rise, and this match is not to be missed!