SASCOC has confirmed that SA’s highest-ranked male tennis player Lloyd Harris has withdrawn from the team to attend the Tokyo Olympics. Photo credits: Sarah Reed/ANA
Rublev stops SA’s giant-killer Lloyd Harris in Adelaide final
Harris’ giant-killing acts saw him despatch Cristian Garin and Pablo Carreno Busta en route to the final after reaching the main draw as a qualifier and earned him a heap of ATP rankings points.
SASCOC has confirmed that SA’s highest-ranked male tennis player Lloyd Harris has withdrawn from the team to attend the Tokyo Olympics. Photo credits: Sarah Reed/ANA
South Africa’s rising tennis talent Lloyd Harris went down 6-3 6-0 to Russian Andrey Rublev in the Saturday’s championship round at the Adelaide International in Australia.
Nevertheless, Harris’ hitherto giant-killing acts which saw him despatch Cristian Garin (6th seed) and Pablo Carreno Busta (4th seed) en route to the final after reaching the main draw as a qualifier earned him a heap of ATP rankings points. When the latest rankings are released on Monday, Harris’ current world ranking of 91 should move up to the 70s region.
With this win, the 18th world-ranked Rublev is on a 12-match unbeaten streak. He should move one or two places up the ladder. Last week, he won the Qatar Open in Doha.
Rublev blows past Harris
It was all over in just under an hour when Rublev signed off with a second-set 6-0 scoreline in just 23 minutes. The Capetonian rising star started the second set poorly with a double fault before dropping serve in the opening game.
Harris second service game in this set didn’t go any better as he dropped serve 0-40. And from that point onwards it was one-way traffic.
Harris gave himself a fair chance in the opening set until the fifth game when he spurned a chance to break Rublev. It was one of four break points that Harris failed to capitalise on in the match.
Rublev wasn’t as generous in the sixth game and when breakpoint beckoned, he broke serve to take a 4-2 lead.
The rest of the set went with serve and Harris was particularly impressive in the eighth game when fired down three consecutive aces. In all, the South African sent down seven aces to Rublev’s four.
In the final first-set game, the SA number two was far too loose with a host of unforced errors. The eventual stats show a 16-6 unforced error margin.
Next up for Harris will be 2020’s first Grand Slam, the Aussie Open in Melbourne, on Monday. He’ll be up against Argentina’s Diego Schwartzman, the 14th seed, who has a world ranking of 42.
The only other SA player in the main will be Kevin Anderson who will play Belarusian qualifier Ilya Ivashka on Tuesday.
