Giant-killer Jarry strikes again: Tsitsipas falls in grass-court debut

Chile’s Nicolas Jarry pulled off the first big surprise of the week at the Libema Open on Thursday, stunning No. 1-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas in a two-hour slugfest on center court, 6-4, 3-6, 6-4.

The first two sets were decided by early breaks—Jarry broke Tsitsipas in the very first game of the match and rode that break to a one-set lead, while Tsitsipas broke Jarry’s first service game in the second set, and the two players held serve the rest of the way until they were headed to a third.

Tsitsipas had his chances in the decider—he had double break point with Jarry serving at 2-all and even brought up a third break point in Jarry’s 3-all service game. But the Chilean held on both times and eventually snuck out the only break of the set in the final game of the match, ripping a deep forehand return that the Greek couldn’t get back on match point to wrap it up after exactly two hours.

It was the pair’s first career meeting.

“It’s a very, very good win,” Jarry told ATPTour.com. “I’m very happy for the way that I played Stefanos, one of the best players right now. He’s so young and he’s doing great this year.”

The 23-year-old Jarry has become quite the giant-killer on the ATP Tour in his young career, his win over the World No. 6 on Thursday already his fourth career Top 10 win. His three previous Top 10 wins came against a No. 8-ranked Dominic Thiem in Hamburg last summer, a No. 6-ranked Marin Cilic in Shanghai last fall and a No. 3-ranked Alexander Zverev in Barcelona earlier this year.

The Chilean actually has a winning record against Top 10 players now: 4-3.

Tsitsipas was playing his first match on grass after an impressive clay-court season that included reaching his second Masters 1000 final in Madrid, falling to Novak Djokovic; and the fourth round at Roland Garros, where he fell to Stan Wawrinka in a five-hour-and-nine-minute, five-set marathon.

The Greek is currently tied with Rafael Nadal for most match wins on the tour this year with 32.

That wasn’t the only surprise of the day on the grass courts of Den Bosch, as No. 4 seed Fernando Verdasco was also ousted in his opening match, falling to Adrian Mannarino, 1-6, 6-3, 6-4.

The other two seeds in action on Thursday both advanced, with No. 5 seed David Goffin beating Pierre-Hugues Herbert, 6-3, 7-5, and No. 7 seed Cristian Garin outdoing Robin Haase, 7-5, 7-5.