Daniil Glinka hits the right notes in Portugal, reaches quarterfinals again
Estonian tennis player Daniil Glinka is through to the quarterfinals of the ATP Challenger 75 tournament in Oeiras, Portugal after beating Mikhail Kukushkin (Kazakhstan) in straight sets, 6:3, 6:4 Wednesday.
Glinka, ranked 200th in the world, faced a player who once ranked as high as 39th and reached the last 16 at both Wimbledon and the Australian Open, though now places 262nd worldwide.
The Estonian had reached the semi-finals of last week's Challenger 100-level tournament in Oeiras, staying on in Portugal for an encore in the form of the current competition.
In set one, Glinka broke Kukushkin's serve three games in a row, though this had to be offset against him losing two of his own service games. Still, it was enough.
Things were more equal in the second set as, while Glinka took the lead immediately with a break, he allowed his opponent to level things out at 4:4, but then won the very next game, albeit only on the fourth break point. In the next game, he held his serve to take the set and match.
While Glinka's first serve was in only 55 percent of the time, he won 84 percent of points played on that first serve, compared with 63 percent for Kukushkin.
Glinka next faces Pablo Llamas Ruiz (Spain), ranked 13 places below him by the ATP.
Mark Lajal limited to one match in France
Meanwhile, top-ranked Estonian player Mark Lajal went out in round one at the ATP Challenger 125 tournament in Quimper, France, going from a set up to lose 6:3, 4:6, 4:6 to Pavel Kotov (neutral flag).
Lajal, ranked 153rd in the world, had only made round two proper (after qualifying) last week in Oeiras, and had not progressed beyond the first round in qualifying for the Australian Open earlier in January.
Kotov, now ranked 485th in the world, had to come through qualifying for the Quimper tournament.
In a frustrating serve-mistake patterned game, Kotov got the better of the Estonian by breaking at decisive points in sets two and three, whereas Lajal only broke Kotov once, in set one, even as things were evenly matched.
Kotov only won five points more than Lajal, but was more effective on first serve (with a 72 percent success rate compared with a 61 percent one for Lajal).
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Editor: Andrew Whyte, Siim Boikov
