Mother Nature was capricious on this first day of the National Bank Open in Montreal. It was Denis Shapovalov and Alex de Minaur who paid the price on Monday night, when their game was stopped in the middle of a tiebreaker.
Posted at 8:59 p.m.
Updated at 9:24 p.m.
The first match of the day between Stan Wawrinka and Emil Ruusuvuori started four hours later than scheduled on center court, due to intermittent rain in the metropolis during the day. Due to the accumulated delay, the game between Andy Murray and Taylor Fritz was simply cancelled.
At 4:50 p.m., just 20 minutes later than scheduled, the candy match of the evening between Shapovalov and de Minaur could begin. Under a cloudy sun, but without rain. Everything we needed.
Good start for Shapo
Shapovalov had underlined it in a press conference on Sunday, his first round match was going to be difficult. After all, de Minaur was ranked one spot ahead of him in the ATP rankings and had just won the tournament in Atlanta last week.
However, the match had started well for the left-hander, dressed in navy blue and orange. His black racquet reflected the center court floodlights and the crowd gave a very warm welcome to the man who knocked everyone down in 2017 on this same court.
The Canadian was smoldering on serve in the first set. Shapo hadn’t served like this for at least a year. His serving games were varied and expeditious. Visibly carried by the crowd, the 23-year-old was combative and eager to snatch every point from his rival.
However, his opponent had seen others and the two knew each other very well. They faced each other often in the junior ranks and de Minaur had won both duels between the two players in the pros.
The Australian was able to respond to the attacks of the local favorite and he even forced the Canadian to make some errors of concentration. Especially on the backhand, where Shapovalov hit the ball a few times with the frame of his racquet.
play at home
It was the lack of opportunism that hurt Shapovalov the most. He screwed up five break points in the second set and even if he competed from start to finish with his opponent, it was not enough to grab a fairly comfortable lead.
It is clear, however, that the Canadian was fueled by the energy of the crowd. After spectacular finishes, he asked for support from the fans at least five times during the game, waving his hand as if he wanted more.
His first name was heard many times and several Canadian flags were waved in an attempt to give fuel to Shapovalov.
Ultimately, it will have served him. It’s his fuel. That’s what’s been driving him since his debut and in a tougher part of his career, he’s sure the crowd support will have served him well at different points in the game. Especially when de Minaur took the lead late in the second set and Shapovalov came back to close the gap. From that moment, he had the wind in his sails.
The second set went to 3-3 in the tiebreaker, when the sounds of closing benches began to echo through the stadium. Everyone looked up to see that Mother Nature hadn’t said her last word.
The umbrellas opened, the players returned to the locker room and the bleachers emptied.
The session was postponed to Tuesday, after 1:48 a.m. The match should resume at 11:00 a.m.