Rublev took revenge on Aliasim and raised him in Marseille

After an exciting final of about 2 hours, Andrei Rublev defeated Felix Ozer-Aliasim 7-5, 7-6 (4) won his 1st title that year but also 9th of his career in 14 finals.

At the same time, the Russian got revenge for last week’s defeat against the Canadian in the semi-finals of the tournament in Rotterdam.

This was Rublev’s 5th title in a 250-tournament tournament (in 6 finals), while the Russian will shortly return to the court where she will team up with Ukrainian Denis Molchanov in the final of their doubles Raven Klaassen (South Africa) and Ben McLalan (Japan).

To clinch the title, Rublev had to erase Aliasim’s set point in game 12 of set 2 just as the Canadian had the momentum of the game, converting it 3-5 to 6-5.

The final started with Aliasim getting a very difficult hold by clearing 2 break points from Rublev, but then with his own break he made it 2-0.

What the Russian failed to do early in the set, he did right after the breakback (2-1), albeit with the Canadian unable to find a first serve while also struggling to win points whenever he found (63%) .

The decisive break of the set came at just the right time for Rublev, who led 6-5 and grabbed the balls to close the set, which he did with a simple grab.

The 2nd set was also the most competitive. Rublev found a break twice, with Aliasim wiping out just one of the pair to go 2 games (3-5) short of the result.

The Canadian reduced to 5-4 with a love game, giving Roublef the opportunity to close that set again on his service. This time, however, Aliasim equalized with an impressive break (Love) to make it 5:5 and later made it 6:5 with a hold.

In fact, he reached a set point (30/40) with Roublef in the next game but took the next 3 points that led the 2nd set to a tiebreak.

There, 3 tragic inside-out mistakes by Aliasim gave Rublev a 3/0 lead. The Russian, on the other hand, managed an accurate tiebreak and reached 7/4 without losing service and thus the 9th title of his career.

SOURCE: Tennis24