2023-04-29 16:33:00
Back in action for the first time in a month, Félix Auger-Aliassime was dismissed in his first match at the Masters 1000 in Madrid by Dusan Lajovic in three sets of 6-2, 3-6 and 7-6.
Auger-Aliassime therefore receives a third defeat in as many duels against Lajovic in his career. FAA lost in 2020 and 2021, without even winning a round.
Seeded seventh in the tournament, Auger-Aliassime was beaten in 2 hours and 32 minutes to be quickly eliminated from the tournament. Recent winner at the Banja Luka tournament, Lajovic offered a particularly strong opposition.
“It was super tight at the end,” analyzed the 32-year-old Serb. “Winning 7-6 in the third set is really good for my confidence,” added Lajovic, who next faces Germany’s Jan-Lennard Struff, who beat Ben Shelton in three sets.
It must be said that the Auger-Alissime match began on a very bad footing. The Quebecer was first broken from the start, before taking another break in service in the third game of the first set.
Auger-Aliassime was unable to recover from a 4-0 deficit and lost the first set 6-2 in just 35 minutes.
But after finding some rhythm at the end of the initial run, Auger-Aliassime continued in the second run. A break of service made in the sixth game of the set allowed him to force the holding of a final set.
Then in the final round, Auger-Aliassime faced two match points from Lajovic, but he managed to resist to push the game to a tiebreaker. Lajovic, however, had the upper hand in the tiebreaker 7-5, capitalizing on his sixth match point.
In his first duel of the tournament, Lajovic took the measure of Jason Kluber, 63rd player in the world, in two identical sets of 6-3.
Auger-Aliassime isn’t the only top-10 player to lose to Lajovic lately. In fact, the latter scored a third consecutive victory in similar circumstances, after he overthrew world number one Novak Djokovic and defeated Russian Andrey Rublev en route to the title at the Banju Luka tournament last week.
FAA still remains active in doubles, along with Denis Shapovalov.
On Friday, they defeated Colombians Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah 7-6 (5), 7-6 (2) in the first round of men’s doubles.
On their next outing, the two Canadians will battle Finland’s Harri Heliovaara and Britain’s Lloyd Glasspool.
Shapovalov will open his singles tournament against Zhang Zhizhen on Saturday
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