In Lexington for the next Challenger tournament Greg was
in qualifying, as the cut for the Main Draw was done three weeks ago when his
ATP ranking was 314, and he missed the final cut by four places. Ranked 242
this week, he is the No.1 seed for the qualifying and had a bye in the
first round. His second round opponent was 21 year-old New Zealander Sebastian
Lavie, who had joined the Morataglou Tennis Academy in Paris at the tender age
of 11. Lavie had shown much promise as a Junior but has not yet delivered on
that yet as a senior player, currently ranked 1019, with a high rank of 784. A
match which Greg should win but for which he will be a tad nervous.
Greg did not serve at a high first serve percentage in
the first set but did convert 90% of his second serve sand was able to get through the
set without facing a break point. In contrast he dominated Lavie's second serve,
winning the majority of points in producing three break point opportunities and
converting two to go 5-2 up and winning the set 6-2. |
| New Zealander Sebastian Lavie |
A confident win by Greg with which he will be pleased. He
lost just two points on his serve in the second set and restricted Lavie to just
6 points on Lavie's serve. Two down and one round to go in his quest to qualify.
Greg said that whilst he served well, his win was not as good as it looked. At the end of the first set Lavie had taken a toilet break and Greg thought that he might as well do so as well. In the toilets he heard Lavie getting sick and figured that Lavie was not well. Greg did well to maintain his focus, and serve and play well in the second set. After the match Greg was sympathetic to Lavie who said he had had a bout of food poisoning.
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