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Pole Position - Hubert Wins Miami Open |
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Hubert Hurkacz is on the first row of the grid at the moment. The 24-year-old from Wroclaw, the fourth largest city in Poland has won the biggest title of his career, the Miami Open and he is the first Polish player to win an ATP Masters 1000. Hurkacz defeated 19-year-old Italian sensation Jannik Sinner in one hour 43 minutes 7-6, 6-4.
With a combined age of 43.81, this was the fifth youngest final in the tournament's 36-year history. The youngest was 30 years ago between Jim Courier and David Wheaton and it is the youngest since 2009 when Novak Djokovic played Andy Murray for the title.
Hurkacz opened up an early advantage but Sinner worked his way back into the final. The Italian broke serve to lead 6-5 and was serving for the first set but he had a disastrous game because he lost it to love and Hurkacz pushed it to a tiebreak which he won 7/4.
The second set was one way traffic as Hurkacz took advantage of Sinner's disappointment. He went up 4-0 and even had a point for 5-0 but this young Italian who is destined for the very top of men's tennis, staged a rally and he clawed his way back into the set, closing the gap to a single break.
Hurkacz served for the championship but admitted later that he was nervous. It's not surprising considering he had never been in this position before. On match point the two players played out a baseline rally before Sinner went for a forehand down the line but the ball landed wide. Hubert raised in arms in victory and relief.
"I was super happy that he missed this shot at the end. I mean, super, super happy that I was able to lift that biggest trophy of my life so far, so that's something special for me," Hurkacz said. "I had chances to go up 5-Love in the second set and he came back. He started to play better.
"I got a little bit nervous. I mean, he took the chance, and it was very close there. So, I mean, he came back, and I was just trying to fight to get my level higher to be able to win some extra points there."
This was a first-time meeting between two guys who are very close friends and who frequently play doubles together. Sinner was pretty gutted at losing but philosophically said there will be plenty of be learned from this experience. He is only the fourth teenager to reach the final and it's not bad company - Nadal, Djokovic and Andre Agassi.
"I made some unforced errors. I made a few or a couple of mistakes in the tiebreak. Then I was not serving well, especially in the beginning of the second set, and not returning deep enough," Sinner said.
"It's for me today is a tough day, to be honest, because losing the final here for me is not easy. But, you know, I was deciding the whole week what to do with the ball. For that time I'm happy. Yeah, today went the wrong way. Today you win or you learn."
"When you're 19 and playing finals here, obviously it's tough, and I wanted to win. I was a bit nervous from the beginning of the match or already yesterday, but it's normal, because you really want to win. But today was not my day, and congrats to Hubi. I mean, that's it."
The doubles title went to the second seeds Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic, 6-4, 6-4 over Dan Evans and Neal Skupski.
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