“You can’t win a tournament the first round but you can damn sure lose it” – Tiafoe happy to survive Altmaier in four
Frances Tiafoe edged out Daniel Altmaier 6-3, 6-3, 6-7 (5), 7-6 (6) on Monday night. He’ll play Chinese qualifier Juncheng Shang in the next round
Tiafoe Australian Open 2023 || AI/Reuters/Panoramic
American Frances Tiafoe, the No 16 seed, advanced to the second round of the Australian Open by edging out German Daniel Altmaier in a four-set battle at Melbourne Park on Monday
Tiafoe defeated Altmaier 6-3, 6-3, 6-7 (5), 7-6 (6) in three hours and 19 minutes.
After storming out to a two sets to love lead, the German with a smooth one-handed backhand reeled in Tiafoe, and nearly pushed the American to a fifth set.
“I got pretty negative there,” Tiafoe admitted after the match. “But I did a good job holding serve and giving myself chance. I had love-40 once in the fourth, didn’t get it and he kept serving well and getting himself out of trouble.
“The tiebreak could have gone either way, and I’m just happy I got out of there. You can’t win a tournament the first round but you can damn sure lose it, so I’m happy I got out of there and gave myself another chance.”
He talked about his colorful on-court look after the match as well.
“I went to Nike distro and they said we got something really cool for you for the Australian Open so I saw it and I was like ‘Yeah definitely gonna rock this.’ I could have rocked something more calm, but I was like no, this is definitely me.”
The 17th ranked American, playing in a sleeveless tee this year,will face Chinese qualifier Juncheng Shang next.
Shang became the first male player from his country to win a main draw match at the Australian Open with a four-set win over another German, Oscra Otte.
Australian Open (Grand Slam), other first-round results (Melbourne Park, hard, USD 24,297,942, most recent results first):
- Roberto Carballes Baena vs. Novak Djokovic
- Yu Hsiou Hsu vs. Alex De Minaur
- Juan Pablo Varillas vs. Alexander Zverev
- Denis Kudla vs. Roman Safiullin
- João Sousa vs. Roberto Bautista Agut
- Aleksandar Vukic vs. Brandon Holt
- Enzo Couacaud vs. Hugo Dellien
- Richard Gasquet vs. Ugo Humbert
- Christopher O’Connell vs. Jenson Brooksby
- Thanasi Kokkinakis vs. Fabio Fognini
- Chun-Hsin Tseng vs. Alexei Popyrin
- John Isner vs. Adrian Mannarino
- Tomas Machac vs. Casper Ruud
- Jan-Lennard Struff vs. Tommy Paul
- Matteo Berrettini vs. Andy Murray
- David Goffin vs. Laurent Lokoli
- Ben Shelton vs. Zhizhen Zhang
- Taylor Fritz vs. Nikoloz Basilashvili
- Maxime Cressy vs. Albert Ramos-Vinolas
- Max Purcell vs. Emil Ruusuvuori
- Alejandro Davidovich Fokina vs. Alexander Bublik
- J.J. Wolf vs. Jordan Thompson
- Nicolas Jarry vs. Miomir Kecmanovic
- Pablo Carreno Busta vs. Pedro Cachin
- Filip Krajinovic vs. Holger Rune
- Diego Schwartzman vs. Oleksii Krutykh
- Zizou Bergs vs. Laslo Djere
- Grigor Dimitrov vs. Aslan Karatsev
- Mattia Bellucci vs. Benjamin Bonzi
- Facundo Bagnis vs. Daniel Evans
- Daniel Elahi Galan vs. Jeremy Chardy
- Andrey Rublev vs. Dominic Thiem
- Marcos Giron vs. Daniil Medvedev
- Stefanos Tsitsipas vs. Quentin Halys
- Thiago Monteiro vs. Constant Lestienne
- Cameron Norrie vs. Luca Van Assche
- Lorenzo Musetti vs. Lloyd Harris
- Vasek Pospisil vs. Felix Auger-Aliassime
- Yannick Hanfmann vs. Rinky Hijikata
- Alex Molcan vs. Stan Wawrinka
- Federico Coria vs. Marton Fucsovics
- Christopher Eubanks vs. SoonWoo Kwon
- John Millman vs. Marc-Andrea Huesler
- Jaume Munar vs. Dalibor Svrcina
- Jiri Lehecka beat Borna Coric (21): 6-3, 6-3, 6-3
- Lorenzo Sonego vs. Nuno Borges: monday
- Sebastian Baez vs. Jason Kubler: monday
- Ernesto Escobedo vs. Taro Daniel: monday
- Rafael Nadal vs. Jack Draper: monday
- Karen Khachanov (18) beat Bernabe Zapata Miralles: 7-6 (3), 6-2, 6-0
- Mackenzie McDonald beat Brandon Nakashima: 7-6 (5), 7-6 (1), 1-6, 6-7 (10), 6-4
- Tallon Griekspoor beat Pavel Kotov (LL): 6-3, 7-6 (3), 6-3
- Denis Shapovalov (20) beat Dusan Lajovic: 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, 6-1
- Yoshihito Nishioka (31) beat Mikael Ymer: 6-4, 6-2, 7-5
- Sebastian Korda (29) beat Cristian Garin: 6-4, 1-6, 6-3, 6-2
- Hubert Hurkacz (10) beat Pedro Martinez: 7-6 (1), 6-2, 6-2
- Corentin Moutet beat Yibing Wu (WC): 6-4, 5-7, 6-2, 4-6, 7-5
- Francisco Cerundolo (28) beat Guido Pella: 6-4, 6-4, 6-3
- Jannik Sinner (15) beat Kyle Edmund: 6-4, 6-0, 6-2
- Tomas Martin Etcheverry beat Gregoire Barrere: 3-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4
- Botic van de Zandschulp (32) beat Ilya Ivashka: 6-3, 3-6, 7-5, 6-3
- Yosuke Watanuki (Q) beat Arthur Rinderknech: 6-3, 6-3, 6-2
- Juncheng Shang beat Oscar Otte: 6-2, 6-4, 6-7 (2), 7-5
