Hamburg (Germany), July 16 Arthur Fils took his time to find his best level as the Frenchman overcame Jaume Munar 5-7, 6-3, 6-1 after delivering a classy third-set performance at the Hamburg Open here on Tuesday. Fils, who reached his first ATP 500 semifinal in Hamburg a year ago, struck a series of scintillating winners off both wings in the closing stages of his first clash with Munar.
Fils converted five of 10 break points he earned, according to Infosys ATP Stats, in his two-hour, 11-minute win. The 20-year-old endured a tough first few months of 2024 and won just seven matches across nine tournaments in February, March and April, but he is now 20-17 for the year after backing up his fourth-round run at Wimbledon with victory in Hamburg.
With his victory against Munar, Fils also extended his lead in the Race To Next Gen ATP Finals. He is in a strong position to reach the season-ending event where he reached the championship match in 2023.
Luciano Darderi also won his first-round match in Hamburg on Tuesday. The Italian defeated lucky loser Nick Hardt 6-1, 2-6, 6-0 to set a second-round clash with Alexander Shevchenko.
Third seed Sebastian Baez also made an impressive start to his Hamburg campaign by dispatching home favourite Dominik Koepfer 6-2, 6-3. The Argentine, who won in Rio de Janeiro in February, is this week bidding to join Rafael Nadal (2013) and Carlos Alcaraz (2022) as the only players to win multiple clay ATP 500s in the same season in series history (since 2009).
The next challenge for Baez will be a second-round meeting with Dusan Lajovic, who downed Felipe Meligeni Alves 6-2, 6-7(5), 6-3. Eighth seed Zhang Zhizhen also made a flying start on the German clay. He overcame Thiago Seyboth Wild 7-6(6), 6-0 to set a clash with Flavio Cobolli.
--IANS
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