Rafa Jódar and Guiomar Maristany are just one match away from qualifying for the men’s and women’s final draws of the Australian Open. The two Spanish tennis players managed to overcome the second phase of qualifying after Jódar beat Luxembourg’s Chris Rodesch 7-6 (10) and 6-3 and Maristany won an agonizing match against the Russian Tatiana Prozorova 6-2, 2-6 and 7-6 (7).
Those who could not advance in the previous were three other Spanish tennis players who played this Wednesday, since Roberto Carballés fell to the Belgian Gilles Bailly 7-6 (4), 6-7 (3) and 6-2; Pablo Llamas lost to Hong Kong’s Coleman Wong, from the Rafa Nadal Academy, 7-6 (7) and 6-0; and Martín Landaluce could not prevent the comeback of the Italian Stefano Travaglia 4-6, 6-1 and 6-4.
A match where Jódar entered very solid, breaking Rodesch’s serve almost at the start and consolidating to lead 3-1 in the first set. However, the Luxembourger managed to recover the lost break, although Jódar achieved a quick counterbreak that Rodesch would return almost instantly to maintain equality in this first set. After this exchange of breaks, both Jódar and Rodesch did not give each other any break options, which caused the first set to go to a tie-break. In the tiebreaker there were alternatives for both of them to close the set since Jódar saved up to three set points against him and then was unable to take advantage of the first two that he had in his favor until, on the third and after taking the minibreak from Rodesch, the Spaniard managed to close the set by serving 12-10 in the tie-break.
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In the second set, the match turned to Jódar, as the Spaniard broke Rodesch’s serve in his first turn of serve and then consolidated and went up 3-0. From there Jódar, who managed to hit 19 winners (due to 23 unforced errors), knew how to maintain his serve, even saving two break points that would have given life to a Rodesch who was weighed down by his 37 unforced errors before closing the set and the match 6-3 in the second and thus remaining just one match away from fulfilling his dream of playing in the final phase of the Australian Open. A place that Jódar will seek this Thursday against the French Luc Van Assche, who beat the Estonian Daniil Glinka 6-3 and 6-0, while Maristany will face the American Elvina Kalieva, who defeated the Chinese Ye Xin Ma 6-4 and 6-2
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