Four seeds have already fallen today in second round matches at the ITF tournament in Heraklion, and one of those is Mario Gonzalez Fernandez, who is Matt Donald’s latest victim. The first half of the first set was full of double faults, with Donald giving away one as he lost the opening game. That was nothing compared with the three that Gonzalez Fernandez served in the fourth game, and that was enough for Donald to be able to break back at the second attempt.
They exchanged breaks again a couple of games later, but the next few games went with serve, leaving Gonzalez Fernandez needing to hold again to force a tie-break. He saved the first two set points from 15-40, and had game points after each of the first two deuces, but Donald had set points after the next two. He converted the last of those, and the set was finally finished after an hour and 18 minutes – and this is on hard courts, not clay!
Gonzalez Fernandez again broke Donald’s serve when they started the second set, and had a game point on his own serve, but Donald won the next five games, the last three of them without losing a point. Gonzalez Fernandez then broke to love and held to love, but he was still a break behind, and Donald didn’t have much trouble serving out the match after two hours and five minutes. The final score was 7-5, 6-3.