Frances Tiafoe suffered a shock exit from the Mubadala DC Open on the opening day of main draw action.
Tiafoe, who was seeded sixth in the draw, won the opening set before losing 6-4, 3-6, 4-6 to French world No.56 Terence Atmane. The American produced 25 unforced errors, with 15 of those coming from his backhand. Furthermore, he was broken three times during the match and won only 14 out of 30 points behind his second serve.
“My respect to him for winning the match, but very, very poor from my side,” Tiafoe said afterwards. “I thought I helped him get over the line today, for sure. A lot of mistakes. A lot of easy mistakes, especially on my backhand. Really poor performance in the last two sets from me.”
It is the first time this year that Tiafoe has lost his opening match at a tournament. Playing at his home event, he was the heavy favourite given that Atmane had lost seven out of his last eight Tour-level matches and has only beaten one top 20 player since January – Felix Auger-Aliassime at the Miami masters.
“Very disappointing,” the former Washington semi-finalist commented. “Especially for the year that I’ve been having, super disappointing. Honestly, that’s all I can really say. I had a lot of high hopes. Yeah, this one hurts a lot.”
Earlier this year, Tiafoe won his biggest Tour title yet at the Halle Open, which is a 500 event. He was also runner-up at the Mexican Open to Flavio Cobolli and reached the fourth round of the French Open.
The world No.19 was making his 10th appearance in Washington, the most among active players. In his four previous appearances, he has reached the quarter-finals or better.
As for Atmane, he will next play Chile’s Alejandro Tabilo. Tabilo ousted Tallon Griekspoor 7-6(3), 4-6, 6-4. The winner of this match could then play second seed Ben Shelton, who is yet to play his opening match.
