DEL POTRO DEFEATED

Juan Martin Del Potro has been defeated by the local boy John Isner in the semi final round of the ongoing Western and Southern Open. Isner won the match in three sets by 6-7(4), 7-6(9), 6-3.

It was a remarkable comeback by the American lad. He was on the verge of defeat at one point of time, but, he fought back amazingly well and ended up pulling off an upset.

This is the second time that Isner has made his way into the title round of a Masters 1000 tournament. He had done that last year as well when he had reached the final of BNP Paribas Open.

Talking to the reporters in the post match interview, Isner said, “It’s fantastic to be in the final of a big tournament again. My form has been decent this season, but, I haven’t been consistent. But, in this tournament, I think I have played some very good tennis.”

In the opening set, neither of the two players managed to sneak a breakthrough in the first 12 games and the scores got tied at 6-6. As a result, the set was extended into the tie breaker.

The tie breaker was pretty tight as well, but, towards the end, Del Potro got a crucial mini break and pulled it off to win the opener.

In the second set, the first 7 games went with the serve and at the end of the 7^th game; the score was 4-3 in the favour of Del Potro.

The Argentinean player extended his lead to 5-3 with a breakthrough in the 8^th game, but, he couldn’t consolidate on that in the next game as his serve was broken for the first time in the match.

The next 3 games went with the serve and the second set went into the tie breaker too. Again, the tie breaker went all the way down to the wire, but, this time, it was Isner who held his nerve and won it to drag the match further.

In the decider, Isner was off to a flier. He broke Del Potro’s serve in the second game and took a lead of 3-0. All he needed to do after that was to win his remaining service games and he did that without having too many problems to knock Del Potro out of the tournament.

In the final match, Isner will face the Spanish superstar Rafael Nadal.