Jan-Lennard Struff beat fifth seed Tommy Paul 7-6 7-6 in the second round of the BOSS Open in Stuttgart on Thursday. As the scoreline suggests, it was a very close match that saw Struff prevail somehow.
The match took more than two hours to be completed, but did not fail to entertain the spectators. The 33-year-old German thus stayed on course for a title on his home soil. He will take some stopping in the quarterfinal, irrespective of whoever his opponent will be.
Jan-Lennard Struff served really big in the match:
Struff is known for his huge serves and they were on display extensively against Paul. The big German fired 21 aces in the match and won a whopping 90% of the points on his first serve. It was quite symbolic when he managed to finish the match off with an ace.
Paul could not do quite enough to match those numbers, but still did his share of powerful hitting. He hit 10 aces in the match and won 75% of the points on his first delivery.
It was evident from the beginning that there were going to be very few breaks of serve in the match. There were only a couple in the end, with both players succeeding in breaking each other once.
Both players displayed classic grass-court tennis:
Both players opted for serve-and-volley on quite a few occasions in the match. Each of them finished a good number of points with volleys. The American managed to pass Struff a few times, but could not deter the German from approaching the net.
The German even opted for return-and-volley a few times. However, it finally boiled down to playing well during key moments, which the German did better than his opponent. Paul, to his credit, fought hard, but was not clinical enough during the tie-breaks.
Main Photo Credit: Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports
