Apia International Sydney Tennis - Australian Open Series

Malisse to meet Luczak in qualifying

Rob O'Gorman Saturday 10 January 2009 4 Comments »

Belgian Xavier Malisse will play Australian Davis Cup team member Peter Luczak for a spot in the main draw of the Medibank International Sydney after both players won through their qualifying matches today at Sydney Olympic Tennis Centre.

Luczak scored an impressive 6-2 6-4 win over former top 10 player Arnaud Clement in the first round before eliminating Czech sixth seed Jan Hernych 6-1 6-3 later in the afternoon.

Malisse defeated second seed Teimuraz Gabashvili 6-2 6-3 this morning before backing up this afternoon with another win over Frenchman Adrian Mannarino 6-3 6-1.

The former world No. 19 and Luczak are among a host of well known players vying to qualify in Sydney this week including Frenchman Clement, Ecuador’s Nicolas Lapentti, Russian Evgeny Korolev and Italian Potito Starace.

After several consistent seasons that kept his ranking inside the top 50, Malisse has been restricted to only 12 tournaments in the past two years due to an ongoing wrist injury he snapped during a match in 2007.

The road back to the top of the tennis tree is a long one but Malisse is up for the challenge and prepared to do the hard yards in the qualifying events to boost his ranking.

“It’s not easy getting back out there, everybody’s playing very good but I feel confident and the injuries so far feel ok so as along I can go out and play I feel have a chance to go well,” Malisse said today.

“The qualifying [events] are very tough. if you look at guys like Clement, Korolev, all these guys are in there and it’s not easy.”

“It [qualifying] is like a tournament on its own but I’ve got to keep grinding and hopefully I will get back up there.”

“I feel I still have my game, it’s just a matter of confidence and getting through the qualifying a couple of times and hopefully go from there.”

Malisse, who lost to American Bobby Reynolds in the final round of qualifying at the Brisbane International last week, said he stills feels as though he can match it with the top players on the tour.

“Today I didn’t play the best but I played good on the big points and it’s still early so it was a good to get out and win,” he said.

“It’s tough to set goals in the beginning, this is only my fourth match in three or four months so my goal is to qualify for a lot of tournaments and if you win a couple of rounds and win a final you can go from [ranked] 160 to 100 so it doesn’t really matter as long as I can go out there and play.”

Luczak was the only Australian to reach the third round of qualifying with Greg Jones, who won his first round match against compatriot Dane Propoggia in the morning, going down to Frenchman Jeremy Chardy 6-4 7-6(3).

In women’s qualifying, Australian Sophie Ferguson fell to Anastasiya Yakamova 6-2 7-5 in her second round match today.

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Tags: Greg Jones, Peter Luczak, Xavier Malisse

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