Both the German and the Norwegian tennis players registered straight forward victories to enter the last-8 in Munich
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Alexander Zverev started his campaign for a third BMW Open title in emphatic fashion on Wednesday. The 24-year-old German enjoyed a comfortable outing against Lithuanian lucky loser Ricardas Berankis to register a 6-2, 6-4 victory in 87 minutes. Zverev, the runner-up in last year’s US Open, is now 13-2 in his past four Munich appearances. He will next play Belarusian qualifier Ilya Ivashka in the quarterfinals.
“I haven’t played much tennis the past few weeks, so I know I’ll need to improve for the next match,” said Zverev after the match. “I’ve had success in the past and I feel good here. I’ve played well in the practice and hopefully I can do better on the match court.”
Zverev, the 2017 and 2018 champion, broke Berankis’ serve three times in the first set. The German started the second set with the same vigour, but Berankis did well to keep the match alive. However, Zverev, who also confirmed that he has overcome his recent right elbow injury, hit a powerful backhand winner to break for 5-4 before sealing the match.
Earlier, second seed Casper Ruud entered the quarterfinals with a straight forward 6-3, 6-2 win over Pablo Cuevas of Uruguay in 68 minutes. Ruud also won 16 of 18 second-service points in the one-sided match. He next plays Australia’s John Millman in the Last-8.
Kevin Anderson’s serve came to his aid as he defeated Spanish lucky loser Roberto Carballes Baena 6-3, 7-6(4) on Wednesday for a place in the Millennium Estoril Open quarter-finals.
The South African struck 12 aces in the match. However, he failed to convert four match points at 5-4 in the second set. He also needed to recover from 2/4 down in the second-set tie-breaker to win the match in one hour and 49 minutes.
“I was 2/4 down in the tie-break, but I managed to raise my level and I fought really well in order to get the match finished in straight sets,” said Anderson. “It was important to forget the 5-4 game, as I think I played some very good tennis out there.”
Anderson will next play sixth-seed Marin Cilic. The Croatian leads their ATP head-to-head record at 6-1.
Earlier, Cilic had to dig deep against Portuguese wild card Nuno Borges on his way to the quarterfinals with a 6-7(5), 6-4, 6-4 victory. The match also witnessed two rain delays.
