The 25-year-old Macháč was the eighth-seeded tennis player at the ATP 250 category tournament, but in the end he could not find the winner. In Saturday’s final, he defeated his French opponent in sets 6:4, 6:7, 6:2 and followed up on last February’s triumph in Acapulco, Mexico.
The Czech Republic will move from the current 35th place to the 24th place in the world rankings. His performances are talked about with great respect and admiration before the opening Grand Slam of the season.
The tennis world marvels at his athleticism, creativity, and spectacular hitting that fills social media once again.
“A trick of nature,” Tennis TV wrote about the shots of a typical jumping forehand that Macháč enjoyed at the end of the second set.
After another exchange, the account of the specialized station again glossed: “This is Playstation tennis from both players. Very good.” The commentator of the official broadcast also joined in, pointing out that Humbert played four shots with which he could have won the ball, but Macháč’s defense was “unbelievable.”
When Macháč deflected a break point with a phenomenal backhand into the corner at a key moment in the first set, the net manager was not left alone.
“This is like a brave man’s manual on how to avoid break points,” it read.
The French opponent just clapped his head admiringly after the blow, following up on Tommy Paul, the American who lost to Macháč in the semi-finals and also expressed great admiration for his art.
“The Czech star’s perfect week,” noted the official website of the ATP tennis association. He dwelled on how aggressively the Czech came into the decisive third set after looking very frustrated after losing the second set tie-break.
His anger, highlighted by a middle finger gesture, was aimed at the team, especially coach Daniel Vack. But he is already used to such outpourings and knows that they help Macháč release the accumulated pressure. The arguments continued even at the beginning of the third set, when the team did not manage to mix the special drink the way the Berun native needed for quite a long time.
But all difficulties soon ended in oblivion. Macháč clearly dominated in the third set and after converting the match point, he sent his big smile towards his “box”.
Of course, there was no lack of thanks in the closing speech.
“Thank you very much to my team. I know that sometimes it’s not easy for me. So let’s hope it won’t be easy in the future. I hope to see you in Melbourne,” he made the audience laugh. In the final match, he recorded excellent statistics of 28 winning balls and 27 unforced errors.
In a few days, Macháče will enter the Australian Open, in the first round his opponent will be the star Bulgarian, the former third player in the world, 34-year-old Grigor Dimitrov.
