Alexander Zverev returned to Grand Slam tennis with a 4-6 6-1 5-7 7-6(3) 6-4 win over lucky loser Juan Pablo Varillas at the Australian Open.
It was the German’s first Grand Slam match back after damaging seven ankle ligaments against Rafael Nadal at Roland Garros.
Some things don’t change though as Zverev grinded out an early five set victory over Juan Pablo Varillas.
The former Grand Slam finalist will play either Michael Mmoh or Laurent Lokoli next.
Zverev started the match relatively well as he held comfortably and kept the lucky loser from Peru away from break point opportunities.
However the German couldn’t last the full pace of the set as after both players saved break points, it was Varillas who struck first breaking for a 5-4 lead.
As expected from Varillas, he liked to extend the rallies which allowed Zverev to find confidence from the baseline and the German almost broke back.
In the end though Varillas saved two break points and closed out the opening set in 54 minutes.
The second set saw Zverev respond in impressive fashion as he worked the angles and powered through his service games.
Two consecutive breaks saw the former US Open finalist take a 4-0 lead and he never looked back as he made it one set all with ease.
Despite being a break up on two separate occasions, Zverev went back to his serving jitters in the third set.
After breaking for a second time in the fifth game, the German played a sloppy eighth game to allow Varillas to break back for 4-4.
The Peru native then broke for the set after saving break point and Zverev had to pull off his trademark five set victory if he wanted to win.
That’s exactly what the world number 13 although it was far from easy with Varillas hardly giving the German the match.
After a positive start to the fourth set from both players, Zverev had the chance to break in the ninth game but couldn’t break as the fourth set went to a tiebreak.
Zverev raced through the end of the tiebreak as he forced a fifth set and in typical Zverev fashion the German sealed the match with a break of serve in the tenth game.
It was far from pretty but effective as Zverev will now face another opponent ranked outside the world’s top 100 in the second round.
