Dennis Novak was eliminated at the ATP World Tour 500 tournament in Vienna’s Stadthalle: The Austrian was defeated by Kyle Edmund from Great Britain in three tiebreak sets.
By Jens Huiber from Vienna
Full stadiums in Austria are no strangers to Dennis Novak: last year, the Lower Austrian was in Kitzbühel’s double final. At the side of Dominic Thiem. On Thursday, Austria’s national holiday, Novak gave the supporting act to the Vienna Stadthalle, and this was highly respectable: Kyle Edmund, a man who has already received the highest consecrations in the Davis Cup, lost 6:7 (2), 7:6 (5) and 6:7 (3) against him.
Novak gave up his serve right at the beginning, followed the early break up to the tenth game, scored the equalizer and played himself in a tiebreak with a great deal of confidence. Edmund, however, also pulled away quickly, scoring 7:2, the match had lasted a total of 57 minutes until then.
The upper tier of the Stadthalle will only be opened for special occasions, two Austrians on the main square form the basis for such an opening. The fact that despite the wonderful weather conditions, some tennis fans were not able to win tickets for the rest of the tickets in front of the entrance, underlined this.
Kyle Edmund had defeated David Ferrer in round one, not a bad visiting card, the Spaniard had already been in the final in Vienna once before. Novak, on the other hand, had scored the rare double strike from qualifying and first round victory against Thomas Fabbiano, 45 points was worth the second victory against the Italian within just as many days, and 20 more were worth the first.
The Briton, currently in 63rd place in the world rankings and two years younger than his opponent, showed the more solid tennis at the beginning of the second set, however, with more spin than Novak, who tried to dominate the rally with his forehand – but often despaired of Edmund’s counter-skills. Again, a comeback Novaks was needed after an early deficit, the chance to do so came in the fifth rack when Edmund turned a 30-0 to 4-1 on his own serve.
A few minutes later, Novak took his first break point in set two with a courageous attack, scoring it with a backhand along the line. Now the audience was back again, but Edmund was shocked at the last minute. In the tiebreak, this time the Austrian got the better start, changed sides with a 4:2 lead and moved to 5:3. Edmund played an unbelievable backhand slice on the baseline, Novak got his first set ball with his own serve – and used it with a crunching forehand.
In the decision Novak took up weather quickly, scored a break point for the 3:1. Edmund refused. The underdog made a better impression, however, and played his service games more confidently than Edmund. In the twelfth game, the Briton scored a double error at 3:30 pm, but still missed a match point from Novak. Tiebreak, third one. The first mini-break for the 3:1 came from a failed stop of the Austrian, this time Edmund passed the chair referee Cedric Mourier with a 4:2 lead. A Novak forehand mistake gave Edmund three match points – the 22-year-old scored the first match points after 2:56 hours.
In the world ranking Novak will improve by about 70 places, scarcely coming close to his career-high of 195. But the 24-year-old will probably have to wait a while for his next performance in front of the full house.
Here the single tableau in Vienna