'About to lose', Mannarino rallies to Almaty win; Evans sets Tiafoe meeting

Eighth seed Adrian Mannarino dug deep Tuesday to keep his title defence hopes alive at the Almaty Open.

Roman Safiullin served for a straight-sets win at 7-5, 5-3, but the Frenchman Mannarino relied on his brickwall consistency to mount a comeback. After two hours and 45 minutes, the 36-year-old secured his place in the second round with a 5-7, 7-6(4), 6-3 victory. In the second-set tie-break, Mannarino won all five of his return points.

Mannarino earned a record-extending 11th match win at the Kazakhstani ATP 250, which was previously held in Astana.

“Today was a tough match. I was down, I was about to lose the match actually,” said Mannarino, World No. 56 in the PIF ATP Rankings. “I don’t know — a little bit of luck maybe and I came back. That was really close.”

With his opening-round win, the five-time tour-level titlist improved to 3-0 against Safiullin in their Lexus ATP Head2Head series. Mannarino, who earned his 300th career match win last month in Beijing, will next meet an Australian: James Duckworth or Aleksandar Vukic.

Other Tour-veterans who advanced Tuesday include Daniel Evans and Aslan Karatsev. Evans, 34, downed Japan’s Taro Daniel 6-2, 7-6(4) after fending off four of the five break points he faced, according to Infosys ATP Stats. The British qualifier will next clash against top seed Frances Tiafoe. Karatsev ousted China’s Zhang Zhizhen 6-4, 7-6(2).

Home favourites Alexander Shevchenko and Beibit Zhukayev advanced. The 23-year-old Shevchenko overcame countryman Mikhail Kukushkin 7-6(5), 7-6(4) while Zhukayev downed Benjamin Hassan 6-4, 6-1.

Otto Virtanen was a 6-3, 7-6(4) winner against Fabio Fognini and Gabriel Diallo powered past Christopher O’Connell 7-6(5), 6-2.

Tiebreak Triumph ?

Shevchenko closes the day with a 7-6(5) 7-6(4) win over Kukushkin!@ktf_kz | #AlmatyOpen pic.twitter.com/9yNIxTQpFp

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