Jurij Rodionov was eliminated in the first round of the grass tournament in Stuttgart on Tuesday. Austria’s currently best-ranked tennis player, who fought his way into the main competition of the ATP 250 event with two victories in qualification, which is worth a total of 769,645 euros, lost to Hungary’s Marton Fucsovics after 2:26 hours 7: 6 (7/5) 3 :6 4:6. The early exit has bitter consequences, especially in the ATP ranking.
“It was a close game that anyone could have won,” said Rodionov. In contrast to the ÖTV actor, his opponent did not make one or two slight mistakes. That could already decide games on grass. On the surface, Fucsovics is not a blank slate, as last year he was the first Hungarian to reach the quarter-finals at Wimbledon since 1948 (including after victories over Diego Schwartzman and Andrej Rublew). Only Novak Djokovic had stopped the 30-year-old’s run.
That’s another reason why the positives outweighed the positives for Rodionov: “The performance was okay. I fought my way through the qualification, I’m happy that I made it into the main draw and then played a good game,” emphasized the 23-year-old from Lower Austria. Rodionov will lose ground in the ATP ranking, and he will also lose his position as the best ÖTV player.
Farewell to the top 150 in the ATP ranking
Because last year he had reached a semi-final on the tour in Stuttgart for the first time in his career, these points are now out of the ranking. He is passed from 129th place at least to 153rd place. He has no problem with that. “I’m confident for the next few months because I won’t lose a lot of points until December because I didn’t win a lot during the last year. That’s why I can play freely,” said Rodionov.
He will continue at Challenger level in Ilkley next week, after which he will try qualifying for the Wimbledon grass Grand Slam tournament. Further tournament planning is still open. Andy Murray, against whom Rodionov had lost in the first round in Surbiton, made it into the round of 16 in Stuttgart. After initial problems, the 35-year-old ex-world number one clearly defeated the Australian Christopher O’Connell 6:4 6:3.
ATP 250 tournament in Stuttgart
(Germany, 769,645 euros, lawn)
