TENNIS ATP Queen’s Club – Grigor Dimitrov conquered his first ever grass title today at Queen’s club by defeating in an epic final Feliciano Lopez 6-7 7-6 7-6. From London, Giulio Gasparin
The Bulgarian, who earlier this week said to aim to the Wimbledon title, needed his best effort to lift the Aegon Championships trophy as he had to save a match point in the second set and finally come back from a break down in the third set.
The hidden face in the towel at the end of the match summed perfectly up the discomfort of his Spanish opponent, who played his very best tennis for the whole match, but in the end, was not able to capitalise.
To be more precise, in the first set, it was Dimitrov who had the biggest chances before the tiebreak, as he was twice denied a break lead by Lopez, who cleared both the break points with his terrific serve and incredible volleys.
Then in the tiebreak it was Lopez to first have set points, but the Bulgarian fought back and he had points to close himself.
The Spaniard denied Dimitrov them and finally managed to find the final push to take the first set 10 points to eight.
In the second set, both players added a gear to their level of play. More and more incredible points followed one the other as these two talented athletes showed the best of their repertoire.
Like in a game of chess, the two hold their serve with authority, in the hope that the other’s level of serve would drop, but this did not happen until 6-5, when Dimitrov was to serve.
The Bulgarian had to face every possible hurdle to hold his serve and his nerves, including a terrible call against him that a shouted challenge proved wrong, but obliged him to replay a point he had already won.
Lopez had a match point, but on Dimitrov’s second serve, his forehand hesitated and the ball slammed on the net.
The missed chance seemed to paralyse the Spaniard, who suffered almost passively a thunderous tiebreak from Dimitrov, who equalised the score.
The small break after the second set helped the 10th seed to find calm and focus. He stepped back on court more aggressive and determined, so that he managed to break his opponent’s serve for the first time in the match.
Having not been broken himself up to that moment, he knew he only needed to keep holding in order to lift the trophy.
But it was not meant to be and at his very first chance, Dimitrov found a fundamental break, which once again forced the two to a tiebreak.
Lopez found the point of the match when he made a stop volley while diving on the lawn to reach Dimitrov’s passing shot, but that was not enough.
The Bulgarian was the first to find a mini-break and have a match point.
Once again the score went back to a dead lock as the fourth seed misshit a comfortable forehand, however, he did not let the second chance go unused and he finally managed to close eight points to six.
Dimitrov, under the eyes of his girlfriend Maria Sharapova, lifted his third title of the season, becoming the only player so far to have won on the three different surfaces.
