Tennis Atlantic

Stebe Outlasts Sandgren, Melzer Advances in Rain-Shortened Monday @TallyChallenger

Under pleasant conditions for most of the morning, many Tally challenger players made quick starts, including Ilija Bozoljac and Greg Jones who both qualified. Bozoljac advanced 6-2, 6-4 over a flummoxed Greg Ouelette, dizzying the American with drop shots galore, and Jones 6-2, 6-0 over Jean-Yves Aubone, who was frustrated by the Aussie’s mix of power and volleying. After being broken in the 2nd set, Aubone took a ball from his pocket and hit it in into Georgia.

In the maiden main draw match of the tournament, Gerald Melzer recovered from a slow start to dominate Salif Kante 6-2 6-0, and Alex Bogdanovic took out Austin Krajicek 7-5 6-1.

The match of the day session was Cedrik-Marcel Stebe’s 2-6, 6-3, 6-3 victory over Tennys Sandgren. Stebe was locked into errors into the first set but found his range in the 2nd and 3rd sets. Eventually Sandgren, who seemed to rely on raw power to win points, let his mental frustration get the best of him.

At one point, after being broken in the 2nd set, Sandgren spiked a ball into the ground and yelled “How do you lose that point?!”. He also banged his racquet into the fence. Sandgren took a 3-0 lead into the 3rd, but it slipped away and he lost 6 straight games to the mellow German Stebe, who dug away.

Unfortunately, rain intruded on the remaining day matches, leaving Peter Polansky, who was up 6-2 1-0 over Dominic Cotrone in a lurch, and cancelling the matches of Bradley Klahn/Nicolas “Nico” Barrientos and Denis Kudla/Somdev Devvarman. Along with the doubles match between Bucaro/Lock and C. Harrison/Venus, those matches are all moved to tomorrow.

The qualifiers are now placed. Bozoljac will play Frank Dancevic, Christian Harrison will play Steve Johnson, Jones will play Tim Smyczek, and Venus will play Donald Young.

—Steen Kirby (story and photos)