He is the surpriser at the 26th GERRY WEBER OPEN: Qualifier Denis Kudla roughs up the competition at the largest German lawn Tournament of the ATP World Tour. Thanks to a very convincing performance he sweeps past the favourite Stefanos Tsitsipas with a 6:3 und 6:4 success getting him to the Quarter-Finals. But Kudlas success is not altogether surprising: He reached the Round of Sixteen in a Grand Slam Tournament for the first time in his career in Wimbledon in 2015.
Denis Kudla has showed an ashtonishing performance at the GERRY WEBER OPEN 2018. Since the first Qualifying round he hasn't lost a single set, playing Guido Pella, Nikoloz Basilashvili and Lukas Lacko. And also against newcomer Stefanos Tsitsipas the Ukrain-born US-American stayed without error. Two dominant servers played the duel on the Centre Court at the GERRY WEBER STADION. Although Tsitsipas' game was more mature during the longer rallies and also his technics were better, errors were too many.
Still the Greek had conquered the hearts of the fans in Halle due to his courageous way of playing and a couple of dives. Especially in the second set he went closer to the net more often and started putting more pressure on his opponant, who is further down in the rankings at at No. 74 in the World. Tsitsipas also brought his one-handed backhand, which is often compared to Roger Federers's, into the match better, he wasn't able to take his chances, though. Denis Kudla, however, got the match-deciding break in the fifth game of the second set. The man from Virginia convinced with his return, his hard service and showed a lot of confidence - not surprising, when you think of his string of success! The big fan of the Stanley Cup-Champions Washington Capitals celebrated his greatest success of the tennis year 2018 by beating Tsitsipas. And the GERRY WEBER OPEN for the Qualifier are perhaps not over for a long time yet.
If he meets Dominic Thiem in the Quarter-Finals, memories of the second round match of the both at the Australian Open in Januar will pop up. Back then the 25 year old lost even though leading 2 sets to 0.
