Gerald Melzer missed the second round of the ATP sand court tournament in Sao Paulo, Austria’s number two defeated Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 4-6,6-3,3-3,3-6 in his opening match.
After 2:03 hours, the world ranking-67 changed. from Spain, who is 42 ranks higher in the ranking than Melzer, his first match point. The left-hander from Vienna had already led with a break of 3:1 in the decisive set, but did not play a game afterwards.
Melzer had been in last year’s eighth-finals of the Brasil Open, which will be endowed with a total of $582,870 in 2018. For the Davis Cup player it was his fourth defeat in the seventh match of the young season. A week ago Melzer was also eliminated in the first round in Rio de Janeiro. Prior to that, he had reached the quarter-finals in Quito/Ecuador.
The Austrian hopes in Sao Paulo are now pinned on Sebastian Ofner, who won the ATP World Tour 250 qualifying tournament and will now face Italy’s Marco Cecchinato in the main draw on Tuesday. Top seeded Spaniard Albert Ramos-Vinolas is the favourite, Fabio Fognini from Italy is second. Dominic Thiem will start this week in Acapulco.