The Spanish player was at the limit but he made it to the second round. Pedro Martínez defeated James Duckworth 4-6, 4-6, 7-6 (7), 6-2, 6-2 at the US Open after four hours and 17 minutes.
Second appearance made by the Spanish player in the main draw of the American Grand Slam. Last year he fell in the first round but he arrived with having won at least one match in all the ‘majors’ of 2021. After facing the European tour on clay where he finished in Kitzbuhel, he arrived without playing a match on concrete.
Duckworth takes the limit moments
Service was going to be paramount on both of us. The first two sets had a very similar outcome since precisely the Australian, managed to break when Alzira’s served with 4-5 in the electronic. Very even duel but that James knew how to prevail in those important moments. With two sets in his pocket, and that feat of trying to overcome them, Martinez continued the fight at Flushing Meadows. With the 2-2 he had to lift a break ball that was very important and again they reached those tough moments.
Martinez saves five match balls
In this partial, Pedro carried out that turn that was choking him. Immediately afterwards, he enjoyed up to three break balls but they were never made. In addition, later, Duckworth had a match ball but the Spanish player achieved the pass to the tie-break. Even so, the sudden death that was going to be very hard for Martínez since James left with a 6-3, but without leaving the match, it was point by point and after putting the 6-6, he again had a 7-6 in against, but closed at 9-7. With which, he won his first set by saving five encounter balls.
Improving Spanish
After spending several minutes in the locker room to change clothes, Martínez ran into a tough game right after he returned, but taking it forward gave him more wings if possible. He did a very efficient partial and competing intelligently. There were 13 winners without any errors. The first break came 4-2 and there James lost all his confidence for Pedro to achieve that double break that led him to win 6-2 and start serving in the fifth set. The sensations had changed a lot with previous minutes.
The last and decisive set began with the Australian returning from the dressing room while Pedro, this time, stayed on the court. Wanting to forget everything that happened, Duckworth returned to the track and began taking the first game, seeming to be back on track. However, Martínez, who had noticed a great improvement in his tennis and mental condition, was going to grit his teeth to go all out and want to find all the nooks and crannies of the stage. There were up to five consecutive games that he achieved by going from 0-2 to 2-5 and subtracting to access the second round.
He went for all in that game against a Duckworth who was increasingly crestfallen because of the Spanish player who had raised his level a lot. It was going to be four match balls that the Spaniard needed to close the event and be an opponent of Andrey Rublev.
