Evans beats defending champion in three sets at ATP Tour event in Florida to set up second-round clash against Lloyd Harris
Wednesday 20 February 2019 08:46, UK
British No 3 Dan Evans dumped out defending Delray Beach Open champion Frances Tiafoe with a fine comeback win.
The third-seeded Tiafoe looked in control of the match against qualifier Evans when he served up 6-5 and 30-love in the second set but was instead broken by his opponent, whose aggressive net play frustrated Tiafoe in the final two sets as he eventually prevailed 3-6 7-6 (7-1) 7-5.
Late drama arose when Evans served for the match up 5-4 in the third set but nerves appeared to get to him and he was broken amid a flurry of unforced errors.
But Tiafoe was broken in the next game and Evans would not make the same mistake twice, winning his final service game at love to set up a second-round match against tournament wild card Lloyd Harris of South Africa.
Juan Martin del Potro looked fully recovered from his knee injury to cruise to a 6-3 7-5 win over Yoshihito Nishioka in the first round.
World No 4 Del Potro, who missed last month's Australian Open to nurse the kneecap he fractured at the Shanghai Masters, showed no ill effects in his first match of the year as he blasted 12 aces to see off baseline specialist Nishioka.
Top American men's player John Isner used his blistering serve to overwhelm Canadian Peter Polansky 6-3 7-6 (7-4) and advance.
Next up for Isner is a second-round meeting with unseeded Slovakian Lukas Lacko on Wednesday.
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