Jan-Lennard Struff surprisingly reached the second round of the French Open. In his first round match on Tuesday, the Warsteiner defeated Alexander Bublik in four sets with 7:5, 6:7 (6:8), 6:4 and 7:5 after a convincing performance. The Kazakh is ranked 10th in the world and was even ranked ninth in Paris. Struff is currently ranked 80th in the world.
However, this difference in the ranking was not noticeable at any point in the game. Struff skillfully parried the Kazakh’s wild, unconventional and surprising game, repeatedly incorporated effective net attacks and hardly offered any attack surface.
Second round extremely exciting
This also surprised Bublik, who took a long time to realize that Struff would be an unpleasant opponent that afternoon. The Kazakh gave up the first set with a double fault. The second round was the most exciting. In the tiebreak, Struff already had three set points, missed all three and still lost the round.
Bublik was suddenly there and played like a top 10 player for the first time at the beginning of the third set. This put the Warsteiner under pressure – but he resisted it both playfully and mentally. When the score was 4:4, he secured the decisive break, which gave him a 2:1 lead a short time later. The second round was now very close.
Struff: “I’m keen”
The fourth movement was once again a rollercoaster of emotions. Bublik took the serve from Struff and served to equalize the set. But then the Kazakh made two double faults in a row, his opponent was now there.
The now 36-year-old from Warstein stayed with himself – supported by a few German fans in the audience – first served his own serve game, then got a break and then served coolly.
The reward: the second round in Paris. “That’s really nice right now,” explained Struff after the game. “That was outstanding support on the court today. I’m now looking to see what happens next. I’m definitely up for it.”
