Thiem Works Hard For Bublik Win At Roland Garros

Dominic Thiem will do well to remember his 50th match win at a Grand Slam championship on Thursday, when he showcased battling qualities for a place in the Roland Garros third round.

Last year’s runner-up recovered from 2-5 down in the fourth set against the charismatic Kazakhstani Alexander Bublik for a 6-3, 6-7(6), 6-3, 7-5 victory over two hours and 30 minutes on Court Philippe-Chatrier, the main show court.

Thiem is now 20-5 at the clay-court Grand Slam championship, where he finished runner-up to 11-time titlist Rafael Nadal in the 2018 final — the first Austrian player to compete in a major final since Thomas Muster lifted the 1995 trophy.

View Infosys MatchBeats Of Thiem’s Win

In an encounter of mixed fortunes, fourth seed Thiem was on a receiving end of an underarm serve from Bublik at 1-4, 30/30 in the first set and then came back from 1-4 down in the second set, but missed a set point at 6/5 in the tie-break.

Having regained the momentum, Thiem became a spectator as the inventive Bublik took a 5-2 lead in the fourth set. But the Austrian began to dig his way out of danger from 15/40 (two sets points for Bublik) in the eighth game. From that point, Thiem won 21 of the next 27 points to fight another day.

The 25-year-old won 83 per cent of his first-service points and committed just 15 unforced errors for a third-round test against Uruguay’s Pablo Cuevas, who was leading Kyle Edmund 7-6(3), 6-3, 2-1 when the No. 28 seed from Great Britain retired due to a knee injury.

World No. 91 Bublik, who has predominantly competed on the ATP Challenger Tour, was making his debut at Roland Garros this week. He is 3-2 in tour-level matches in 2019.