Marin Čilić lost in the semifinal of the Adelaide International on Saturday. The best Croatian tennis player lost to Karen Khachanov (ATP 29) 7:6 (3), 6:3. This was the first victory for the Russian in their third meeting. Čilić was better in Cincinnati in 2018 (7:6, 3:6, 6 4) and last year in St. Petersburg, where he beat Khachanov 6:4, 6:7, 6:4 on the way to the title.
It is interesting to point out that Croatian coach Vedran Martić is again the coach of Khachanov after he parted ways with Čilić at the end of last year.
In the first set, the Russian player opened the tie-break with 3:0 and kept that advantage. In the second set, Marin missed three break opportunities at 1:1, and Khachanov used his second break point and went to 3:1, which was enough for him to win. Čilić had a first-serve percentage of 54% (Khachanov 71%), had eight aces and three double faults. He will also play in the Adelaide tournament next week, followed by the Australian Open.
Ivan Dodig and Marcelo Melo advanced to the final of the same tournament after beating Ariel Behar of Uruguay and Gonzalo Escobar of Ecuador 6:3, 6:7 (6), 10:2.
This is Dodig’s 37th doubles final of his career. He played with Melo from 2013 to 2016 and had a lot of success. Among other things, they won Roland Garros in 2015 and were Wimbledon finalists in 2013. They are after their seventh joint title in Adelaide (the first since 2016). Recall, Dodig also won the Australian Open last year with partner Filip Polášek.
In the final, their opponents will be Rohan Bopanna and Ramkumar Ramanathan. The Indian duo beat Tomislav Brkić (BiH) and Santiago Gonzalez (Mexico) with 6:2, 6:4.
Source: HRT
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