(Washington) Denis Shapovalov easily won 6-1, 6-4 against Roberto Bautista Agut in the first round of the Mubadala Citi DC Open in Washington, Monday night.
Ontario ranked 139e at the ATP converted five of his 15 break points during the match which lasted 1 hour and 28 minutes.
For his part, Bautista Agut converted two of his seven break points.
Shapovalov started the match with a bang. The Canadian won the first five games of the match, breaking twice in the process. Bautista Agut then won his first game, on serve, but Shapovalov wrapped up the first set in the very next game.
The second set was tighter. Both men broke serve twice each to find themselves neck and neck at 4-4. At that point, Shapovalov broke his opponent for a fifth time to take a 5-4 lead, and rolled on his next serve to win the set and the match against the 76e in the world.
Shapovalov hit 19 winners in the match, compared to just one for his opponent. He also put 67 percent of his first serves into play.
The 25-year-old athlete, however, committed nine double faults, two more than his opponent, for only four aces.
Shapovalov won 67% of points on his first serve, and 36% on his second, compared to 60% and 18% for Bautista Agut.
Shapovalov has now won both of his meetings with the 36-year-old Spaniard.
The match was suspended for just over an hour due to rain with Shapovalov leading 6-1, 2-2.
The Canadian will face Adrian Mannarino in the next round. The Frenchman is the 6the tournament seed and 32e world racket.
The Citi Open is an ATP 500 tournament played on hard courts. Most of the world’s best players are currently at the Paris Olympics tournament.