(Dubai) Félix Auger-Aliassime lost 7-6 (4), 6-4 to Lorenzo Sonego in the second round of the Dubai Tennis Championship on Wednesday morning.
The Quebecer now has a career record of 2-1 against Sonego, after losing after an hour and 55 minutes of play on the cement in the United Arab Emirates.
From the start, Auger-Aliassime struggled to establish his serve game.
The fourth seed of the tournament only put 46% of his first service balls in play in the first set, against 79% for his opponent. Despite everything, the game was tight since no break point was recorded in the first set.
Sonego, however, stood out with 13 winners, against only 10 for the representative of the maple leaf, which eventually allowed him to win the first set.
The trend continued in the second set, and the Italian even managed to take the lead on the ninth racket in the world. Sonego notably dominated the column for first and second serves, and he did just enough to convert one of his three break points.
It was by taking advantage of a double fault by Auger-Aliassime in the seventh game of the second set that Sonego was able to obtain the decisive break.
Meanwhile, Auger-Aliassime tried somehow to find solutions to revive against the 67e player in the world. We have to admit that he came up short, being unable to afford a single break point of the match.
The Italian converted the first of his two match points, with a winning shot.
In the quarter-finals, Sonego will meet seventh-seeded German Alexander Zverev, who defeated Australian Christopher O’Connell 7-5, 6-4.
Auger-Aliassime was the only Canadian competing in Dubai.
