French Open: Seppi in round three for the first time after a marathon match

In the first set, neither Seppi nor Kukushkin showed weaknesses in their own service and secured their six service games. Both opponents also gave each other nothing in the tiebreak: After Seppi had moved away to 3-0, the Kazakh turned the tables and secured the tiebreak with 7:5. At this point, 58 minutes had already been played.

If Seppi showed teething problems in the first set, as he often does, he was all the more confident in the second round. After Kukushkin promptly took his serve, he responded with a re-break to make it 1-1. As a result, the Kalterer didn't let anything go wrong and pulled away with two more breaks to make it 6:2.

But the world number 55 didn't let that bother him. In the third set he was 1-0 up on his opponent's serve and increased his lead to 2-0 on his own game. Afterwards, Seppi tried to shorten the score, but when the score was 2:4 he had to give up his serve again. Kukushkin's set win was ultimately just a formality.

The interplay continued in the fourth set: The 28-year-old from Überetsch was now wide awake and took the lead 3-0. Kukushkin only showed a reaction on his second serve game. But it was now too late for a successful comeback, because Seppi had now found his way back to his old strength and clearly won the following three games.

In the decisive fifth set, Seppi offered his best tennis. The preliminary decision was made at 2:2 when the South Tyrolean took his opponent's serve and immediately increased it to 4:2. Kukushkin's resistance was now definitely broken. After three hours and nine minutes of play, Seppi used the first match point to make it 6-2.

Seppi better than ever in Paris Seppi is playing in Roland Garros for the seventh time this year. In his first three appearances he failed to get past the first round, but the last three years he was eliminated in the second round. With the victories against Davydenko and Kukushkin, he achieved his best result in the French capital this year. The last time Seppi reached the third round of a Grand Slam tournament was in Wimbledon in 2009.

Now Seppi meets clay court specialist Fernando Verdasco (Spain/14), who beat Gilles Muller (Luxembourg) in four sets 6:7, 6:3, 6:2, 6:2. If you win, your opponent in the round of XNUMX could be top seed Novak Djokovic (Serbia).

In the doubles, Seppi and his compatriot Flavio Cipolla compete against the duo Matthew Ebden/Ryan Harrison (Australia/USA).

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French Open: Seppi in round three for the first time after a marathon match

Italy's currently best separation professional added another highlight to his career on Wednesday: After a five-set win against the Kazakh Mikhail Kukushkin (6:7, 6:2, 2:6, 6:1, 6:2), Seppi is standing at the Grand Slam tournament in Roland Garros for the first time in the third round.

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