Kei Nishikori has taken the next step towards making a comeback on tour at the ATP-Challenger tournament in Dallas.
A success against Dennis Novikov – this result would not really be worth mentioning for a player in the category of Kei Nishikori. However, if you take into account that Nishikori lost to the same opponent a week ago in Newport at the local Challenger – and took revenge with the 6:3,6:3 victory in Dallas.
For Nishikori, it’s less about collecting points for the ATP World Ranking on the second level of professional tennis. Rather, the Japanese would like to test whether his operated wrist meets the demands of the tour. So far, so good.
“I still have some things to work on,”Nishikori said after the match,”but my wrist felt good, and that’s a relief,” he also said, saying he was satisfied with his serve return. And he would also have kept his nervousness in check better than a week ago. Nishikori’s last appearance on the big stage was last summer’s three-set defeat against Gael Monfils in Montreal. At the moment, the best Japanese player in the world ranking is in 27th position.
Nishikori is in first place in Dallas and in the second round he will meet either Russian qualifier Evgeny Karlovskiy or Matthias Bachinger from Germany.