Canada’s Denis Shapovalov made his tennis tournament debut in Barcelona on Wednesday, winning in straight sets 6-4, 6-3 over Slovakia’s Jozef Kovalik in the second round.
The Ontarian, who had benefited from a pass for the second round of the competition on clay, needed 80 minutes to defeat the 155th player in the world, a qualifying rival. Also, he will have an opportunity to fight with Stefanos Tsitsipas in his next meeting as he easily got rid of Argentine Pedro Cachin.
Shapovalov, No. 28 on the ATP Tour and 14th seed in Spain, admittedly committed all four double faults in the duel, but he dominated 13-2 in aces. He also saved all seven break points he faced while taking the opponent’s serve twice.
Tsitsipas is the second seed in the event and fifth in the world. Despite the Greek’s good track record, it was the Canadian who won most duels between the two 24-year-old tennis players. “Shapo” got away with three wins in four duels, most recently at the ATP Cup 2020.
Tsitsipas, finalist in Barcelona in 2018 and 2021, was defeated by Rafael Nadal in the final each time. This year he wants to go all out.
“It’s always a motivation to set foot on those pitches. Obviously the good memories are here in a corner of my memory. There are two finals left [perdues]but I keep the positive instead of thinking too much about what went wrong,” he told the ATP website.
In addition, Félix Auger-Aliassime does not take part in the tournament.