Stefanos Tsitsipas and
Dusan Lajovic booked places in the
Hamburg European Open quarterfinals with convincing victories over Pablo Cuevas and Karen Khachanov.
Dusan Lajovic didn't have a great time in North America as his results have been rather disappointing but he slowly returns to form on clay. His smashing of Karen Khachanov today shows he is slowly regaining the form that made him a top 30 player in the world. His 62-minute demolition of Khacahnov was a pure masterclass of tennis with solid serving, solid baseline play and good winning percentages of both his serves. Winning 6 of 13 breakpoints didn't hurt either. All in all, it was a convincing 6-1 6-2 victory for Lajovic.
Stefanos Tsitsipas had a harder time against Pablo Cuevas as it took him about 90 minutes to win his match but it was still in straight sets. The first set was especially hard for the Greek who only broke through the defence of Cuevas in the 12th and final game of the set. The result was 7-5 and it almost went the other way as Stefanos had to save 4 break points late in the set which could have given Cuevas enough to win the set.
Ultimately the Greek settled and won it conveying his only break point of the set. The 2nd set was a bit easier for the Greek but he still didn't play particularly well. He was clinical on his own serve but he couldn't' do much on Pablo's serve. At 5-4 in the 2nd set Tsitsipas played his best game of the set securing himself 3 consecutive match points. He would use the first one to seal the 7-5 6-4 victory.