Match report

Igor Andreev © Tennistalk.com
ATP Masters Series Monte Carlo
3rd round
4/24/08 1 2 3 Tot
ru  Igor Andreev 7 4 6 2
es  Nicolas Almagro 5 6 4 1
Nicolas Almagro © Tennistalk.com

  • Andreev Pulls Off Huge Win Over Almagro

    4/24/08 5:58 PM | Ricky Dimon
    A highly-anticipated showdown between two clay-court stars lives up to its billing as Igor Andreev takes out Nicolas Almagro in three tough sets. Andreev moves on to the quarterfinals, where he will face Nikolay Davydenko.

    Igor Andreev outlasted Nicolas Almagro 7-5, 5-6, 6-4 on Thursday afternoon to reach the quarterfinals of the Masters-Series Monte-Carlo. The players traded blows throughout the spirited affair until Andreev finally delivered the knockout punch late in the final set.

    Both Andreev and Almagro came out swinging and neither player would budge on his own serve throughout the first 11 games of the match. Andreev especially held serve with ease, thanks to putting in 69 percent of his first deliveries in the opening frame of play and firing seven aces. Almagro struggled through a few tight service games and he finally cracked down 6-5. The Russian capitalized on his first break point of the game to take the opening set.

    Set two was a much different story for both players. Andreev's serve fell off the map in the opening game, as Almagro secured a break for 1-0, and it never got back on track after that. Andreev managed to stay in the set, however, because Almagro also endured an extremely tough time of holding his own serve. With neither player able to gain any advantage on serve, the match became a mano-a-mano baseline slugfest and the result was five breaks of serve in the first seven games of the second set. Finally Almagro consolidated a break by holding at 4-3 and he went to serve out the set after Andreev held at 3-5.

    The third set turned out to be a carbon copy of set one. Suddenly Andreev and Almagro began holding serve again, with the Russian for the most part having an easier time of doing so. It surely helped Andreev that he served first in the decisive frame, thus always putting the pressure on Almagro to hold serve and keep the set on level terms. The Spaniard was able to do just that until his critical 4-5 service game. A long, grueling, tension-filled game saw Almagro save a whopping seven match points, but finally Andreev put an end to the madness and won 6-4.

    Andreev will next take on fellow Russian and fourth-seeded Nikolay Davydenko, who also survived a tough test by knocking out Philipp Kohlschreiber in three sets.

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