The first Thursday at the U.S. Open signaled the beginning of the men’s second round and the conclusion of the same stage of the women’s event. It got started with a showdown on Louis Armstrong Stadium between Angelique Kerber and Genie Bouchard. It was a thoroughly entertaining match featuring a significant contrast in styles. Even though Bouchard is the smaller of the two, she was blasting forehands and backhands from all over the baseline while Kerber was content to block everything back with impressive defense. Bouchard’s tactics–and an on-fire backhand–worked in the second set, but Kerber was an absolute brick wall in the first and third sets and that allowed the German to survive.
Next up on Armstrong was an all-Spanish clash between David Ferrer and Roberto Bautista Agut, a rematch of a Wimbledon encounter earlier this summer. Ferrer won in four at the All-England Club and he did the same this time around in New York. The world No. 4 had been dreadful in Montreal and Cincinnati and he was not exactly the Ferrer of old in this one, but he at least played decent tennis and that was enough for him to come out on top of a favorable matchup. Bautista Agut has a similar game but his defense is not as good and his Grand Slam experience is obviously nowhere near that of Ferrer.
A good show on the relatively new Court 17 featured the relatively unknown Daniel Evans, who was going up against Bernard Tomic. Not too surprisingly, Evans simply wanted this one way more than Tomic. Coming off a straight-set upset of Kei Nishikori, the Brit continued to play some of the best tennis of his career. He started out slow perhaps due to nerves, but sets two, three, and four were mostly all Evans. Watched intently by writer and crazed British supporter Neil Harman in addition to Judy Murray (Andy Murray’s mom, of course), Evans showcased an outstanding one-handed backhand and an aggressive all-court game that was simply too much for his opponent.
Sam Querrey vs. Adrian Mannarino on the Grandstand continued a stretch of mediocre, relatively one-sided matches. The first three sets all went to tiebreakers, but Querrey for the most part was playing the same listless tennis that had been on display in Winston-Salem. He managed to pull out the third and force a fourth, but one break allowed Mannarino to avoid going to a fifth. It was a deserved win for the Frenchman, whose variety in his game was simply too much for Querrey’s one-dimensional ball-bashing.
Taking place on Armstrong mostly at the same time were the Williams sisters against Carla Suarez-Navarro and Silvia Soler-Espinosa. Venus and Serena actually lost the first set, which turned out to be a good thing because they took no prisoners the rest of the way and that made for high entertainment. Whenever they had the opportunity, the would destroy groundstrokes as hard as the could right at the net-hugging Spaniards. Needless to say, it rarely ended well for the Spanish duo.
Outer-court action included Ivan Dodig vs. Nikolay Davydenko, Philipp Kohlschreiber vs. Edouard Roger-Vasselin, the Polish doubles duo of Jerzy Janowicz and Lukasz Kubot, and Maria Kirilenko. Dodig ran over a seemingly uninterested Davydenko (what’s new?), Kohlschreiber looked extremely dangerous in a four-set win, Janowicz and Kubot put up a good fight against Qureshi and Rojer even though Janowicz had a bad back, and Kirilenko made quick work of Michelle Larcher de Brito–who, thankfully, was not screaming in peak form like she sometimes does.
The day suddenly went from good to great with one of the most exciting encounters of the tournament, the evening match on Armstrong between John Isner and Gael Monfils. Isner had been red hot throughout the hard-court summer whereas Monfils had been forced to retire from the Winston-Salem final due to an abdominal strain. If domination by Isner was expected, the first two sets went according to plan. Seemingly resigned to his fate, Monfils was up to his typical Monfils antics in the third–throwing himself all over the court, attempting (and often converting) ridiculous shots, and firing up the crowd. Lo and behold it somehow paid off in the form of a comeback, as the Frenchman forced a fourth set from just about out of nowhere. He even turned the crowd in his favor. Yes, leave it to Monfils to get American fans rooting against their No. 1 player at their own Grand Slam event. That set the stage for a wild and high-quality fourth, in which Monfils still had tons of support in hopes of a fifth set while some of the American fans made their voices heard with chants of USA, USA…. It was a Davis Cup atmosphere from the first ball of the fourth set through the tiebreaker, but there would be no fifth. One mini-break would have been enough for Isner, but he snagged a second with Monfils serving at 4-6 after the underdog had saved one match point. Great hug at the net following match point and raucous applause for both competitors as they exited.
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