Stefanos Tsitsipas suffers shock first-round loss to Daniel Galán at US Open
Updated: 2019-09-13 07:58
By Liu Jing
Daniel Galán, who was a member of the Fed Cup team in 2016, has beaten Stefanos Tsitsipas, who was a member of the Fed Cup team in 2009. (Photo: AFP)
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“I was really excited when I saw that he was ranked first. I thought he was so strong. How could you not be happy when you see somebody that good? You have to love their game.”
Stefanos Tsitsipas was disappointed but not quite shocked after going down to Daniel Galán 6-4, 2-6, 6-1, 4-6, 4-6, 3-6, 7-5 in their first-round match at the French Open.
Tsitsipas lost the first set 6-2 and then lost the second set as well. Tsitsipas’ main rival is now world No. 1 Novak Djokovic, who beat him in the third round last month.
Galán has not been able to recover from the first set after he was up 6-3 and then up 6-4 in this set. He said: “I was really happy to get a good result at the end of the first set. With the first set I was close to winning and then after I lost it was difficult for me to find my style because of the result I obtained in the first set.”
He added: “It is only a small disadvantage. I learned a lot from the match, especially the rallies.”
In his last match, the top-seed Tsitsipas had beaten Denis Istomin, who in his own match was a top-seed as well. Tsitsipas had been up 2-1 in the second set and then got his serve out to break Istomin’s serve and win the set. He then had a break of serve in the second set to win the match 7-6, 4-6, 6-2.
Asked how to deal with pressure, Tsitsipas said: “There are different ways. For example when I feel good, I think that the
