Andrey Rublev escapes against Federico Coria in Bastad

Andrey Rublev returned to tennis in Sweden and he made a winning start albeit it was a tricky start against Coria 7-5 4-6 7-6(2).

Andrey Rublev has not played in a while having to sit out Wimbledon due to the ban but he made a return at the Nordea Open in Bastad. It was a tricky match for Rublev against a clay specialist who can play very well on this surface. He certainly played quite good today forcing Rublev to play some of his better tennis to get it done.

It was a messy first set because Rublev is the better player but he was quite rusty in this one. Coria played well but he did not have enough in the opening set to win it despite breaking the Russian multiple times. Both played quite aggressively so it was a match that had many momentum switches. The 2nd set was the polar opposite as neither player had many issues on serve this time around.

We did not see a single break point until very late in the set and that was quite different to the first which had multiple breaks of serve. Rublev faced issues at 4-5 giving Coria a couple of chances and the Argentine got it done 6-4. The final set was quite interesting because Rublev struggled with his rhythm but was able to jump out to a 3-1 lead.

He did not hold it as he lost his serve at 5-4 when he served for the match. It went into a tiebreak but Rublev finally found a breakthrough to finish off the match 7-2.