Despite multiple rain delays, the first two rounds of qualifying were completed over the weekend in Atlanta. Highly-touted American Francis Tiafoe, 16, played in his first ATP event and earned a victory before going down in a thriller on Sunday night.
The future may not be right now for Francis Tiafoe, but the 16-year-old from the Washington, D.C. area whose parents are from Sierra Leone showed promising signs over the weekend at the BB&T Atlanta Open. In his first ATP-level match, albeit in qualifying, Tiafoe took down Benjamin Balleret 6-4, 6-2. It was a somewhat bizarre encounter in which Balleret had no interest whatsoever in being on the court in the second set. Tiafoe stayed focused, though, and took care of business.
His second-rounder on Sunday night was much more spirited affair against Michael Venus. With an inspired opponent on the other side of the net this time around, Tiafoe had a better opportunity to showcase his skills. For the most part he delivered, producing some spectacular shot-making at times–especially off the forehand side. His serve peaked at 127 MPH, although he was generally content to spin in his first deliveries as opposed to bringing out the big one. In the end, Venus’ superiority at net and his experience proved to be the difference. The 26-year-old from New Zealand, ranked 349th in the world, battled back from a break down in the third and then rolled through the final-set tiebreaker.
Tiafoe wins the second set:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pGE69gLmm8]
The scoreboard tells the tale:
Ryan Harrison, Pat Harrison, and their crew at Tiafoe vs. Venus:
Among those on the practice courts over the weekend were doubles partners Denis Istomin and Marinko Matosevic. They discussed a variety of topics ranging from the downed airliner in the Ukraine, to Istomin’s mom not coming to the United States for the summer hard-court swing, to making fun of Frank Moser for losing his first-round qualifying match.
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