Second seed Alexander Zverev started his title defence with a 6-2 6-1 win over Argentin’s Camilo Ugo Carabelli at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia in Rome. Zverev converted six of his ten points to improve his record against players from outside the top 5 to 23-1 in Rome.
Zverev converted his third break point in the first game and held serve at love to open up a 2-0 lead. Carabelli broke back in the fourth game to draw level to 2-2. Zverev won four consecutive games with two breaks of serve to close out the first set 6-2.
Zverev broke three times to seal the second set 6-1.
Zverev will take on 20-year qualifier Vilius Gaubas from Lithuania, who upset Denis Shapovalov 6-3 6-4.
“I think in general it was a pretty good match. He’s obviously not a guy who has the biggest game, but all in all I did my things well and I’m happy about that”, said Zverev.
Jack Draper beat Luciano Darderi 6-1 6-4 in front of enthusiastic fans to reach the third round. Draper broke three times to close out the first set 6-1 in 24 minutes.
Draper saved a total of six break points in the third, seventh and ninth games before earning three match points on Darderi’s serve. Darderi saved the first match point, but Draper sealed the win with a break on his second opportunity as Darderi made a double fault. Draper improved to 2-0 in his head-to-head matches against Darderi.
Draper won his first Masters 1000 title in Indian Wells and finished runner-up to Casper Ruud in the Madrid Masters 1000 final.
Jack Draper: “I put a lot of energy into that, so coming here to different conditions, a different environment, I had to adapt quickly against a good player in a different atmosphere. I thought I did a great job today of handling that, and hopefully as the rounds progress, I can keep on getting better.”
