Sixth-seeded John Isner was upset by Peter Gojowczyk in the second round of the Delray Beach Open, despite holding three match points and tying a season-high 30 aces in the match.
The big-serving American was a late addition to the field in Delray Beach after accepting a wildcard a few days after losing to Radu Albot at the New York Open. He was able to get revenge on Albot yesterday, winning a tight three-set match, but he still hasn’t been able to string together back-to-back wins in 2018.
Isner noted after his win yesterday that the lack of match play made it tough for him to get his footwork going, but winning real matches would help. Today was a step backwards especially after having a chance to close out the match in the third set with three match points on Gojowczyk’s serve before heading into the tiebreaker.
Even though Isner has reached the semifinals three times in Delray Beach, he’s never really played his best tennis there compared to other tournaments in the United States. This was the first time Isner played in Delray Beach since 2015, when he lost to Australian Marinko Matosevic in the first round. In 2016 Isner opted to participate in the Golden Swing, playing in Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro.
Isner will now head to Acapulco where he’ll once again try and gain some momentum before Indian Wells and Miami. It’ll be interesting to see if he can play as well in those two as he has in the past, including a semifinal appearance in Miami and a final appearance in Indian Wells. He doesn’t have much to defend in the next few week as he underperformed this time of the year last year, so it’s an excellent opportunity to get his ranking up from #18 in the world.
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