SWEDEN’s BJORKMAN STUNS TOP SEED PUERTA IN VIETNAM OPEN SEMIS
Fortune’s good fairies smiled broadly on Jonas Bjorkman of Sweden who uncorked a near-perfect game to upset top seed Mariano Puerta of Argentina 6-1, 6-0 in the semi-finals of the USD$380,000 Vietnam Open ATP Tennis Tournament at the Phu Tho Indoor Stadium in Ho Chi Minh City today.
Wickedly angled serves, deft volleying and, in the crunch, grand passing shots enabled the 33-year-old Swede to flummox the powerful Argentine, seeded No. 10 in the world, in 1 hour and 7 minutes of a match that was expected to go the full distance but did not because Puerta was stumped for an answer.
“Bjorkman played a perfect game,” Puerta said after the match, “there was just nothing I could do.”
He summarised the reasons for his defeat: “Bjorkman served well, he came to the net well, and he played some great passing shots.”
Bjorkman, ranked 93rd in the ATP list, said he had been waiting a long time to play as well as he did against Puerta. “I have been waiting for a year and a half for this moment where I am hitting the ball well and feeling great in my body,” he said.
Bjorkman will meet Radek Stepanek of the Czech Republic who accounted for second seed Thomas Johansson of Sweden 7-5, 6-4 in 1 hour and 48 minutes of a more closely contest semi-final.
Obviously tired from his Davis Cup exertions on behalf of his country against India in New Delhi the previous week, Johansson, who is ranked nine places above Stepanek in the ATP rankings, could not ratchet up his game a few notches to catch Stepanek in the second set.
“I saw that he was tired in the second set,” said the rangy Czech, “and I continued to be aggressive to take advantage of his condition.”
The aggression paid off with the fitter, more prepared Stepanek breaking Johansson’s serve early and then holding his own in the remaining games to clinch victory.
The two had met on hardcourt earlier this year with the Swede winning the first time in straight sets, so this was sweet revenge for Stepanek.
The final of the doubles competition, which has been wracked by injury and illness to a few players, will see Ashley Fisher of Australia and Robert Lindstedt of Sweden play Lars Burgsmuller and Philipp Kohlschreiber of Germany.
Fisher and Lindstedt beat Alexander Popp of Germany and Jiri Vanek of the Czech Republic 6-3, 6-2 in one semi-final. Bursmuller and Kohlschreiber received a walkover in the other semi-final from Juan Pablo Brzezicki and Juan Monaco of Argentina. Brzezicki took ill before the match and thus the Argentine pair had to concede defeat.
