TENNIS – The ATP Mercedes Cup in Stuttgart is held for the first time on grass after being played on clay until 2014. The tournament made surface change as well as moved the date to June instead of July so as to coincide with the start of the grass court season in preparation for Wimbledon, the 3rd major of the year. The first edition of this tournament was held in 1898 but Mercedes Benz assumed the title sponsor from 1979. Diego Sampaolo
The top-seed of the tournament is Rafa Nadal who won in Stuttgart in 2005 and 2007 when the tournament was held on clay. He will play Marcos Baghdatis in his first match. The other top seeds are Marin Cilic (2), Feliciano Lopez (3), Gael Monfils (4), Bernard Tomic (5) and Philipp Kohlschreiber (6). Tomic is set to play local favourite, Tommy Haas who had been sidelined by injury for monts.
Monfils, who reached the 4th round at the Roland Garros where he lost against Roger Federer, edged past Andreas Haider-Maurer 7-6(6) 7-6(5) in a match without any breaks of serve. In the 1st set Haider-Maurer did not convert a set point at 5-4 on the Monfils serve. The Austrian player got a mini-break lead but Monfils closed out on his 2nd set point at 8-6. Monfils failed to convert a break point at 1-0, while Haider-Maurer again could not take advantage of a break point at 4-4. Therefore another tiebreaker was needed to decide the set. Monfils once again won the breaker and the match on his 2nd set point.
In the quarterfinal Monfils will take on Kohlschreiber who beat former Wimbledon semifinalist Jerzy Janowicz 6-4 6-4. Monfils leads 9-2 in his head-to-head matches against Kohlschreiber but the German beat the Frenchman on grass in Halle four years ago. Sam Groth fought back from a set down to upset the 3rd seed Lopez who is a very competent grass court player with 3-6 7-6(5) 7-6(6) scoreline. Groth won 100% of his first service points in the 2nd set and 91% in the 3rd set. In a match where there were just two break points (one for each player) and only 1 break, Groth won the second set tie-break with 7-5 before clinching the third set with 8-6 on his second match point.
Groth will face Viktor Troicki (8) who edged past young German Aleksander Zverev with 6-3 6-7(6) 6-3. Zverev lost the 1st set and trailed 1-3 in the 2nd set. Zverev broke serve in the 2nd set before forcing it to the tie-break. Zverev saved two match points before winning the tie-break with 8-6 to force the match to a 3rd set. Troicki took control of the match in the third set where he won with 6-3. Troicki converted 3/9 break point chances and won 75% of his first serve points.
