Michael Stich stayed on course for a successful title defence at the BlackRock Tour of Champions event in Graz, Austria after scraping past Goran Ivanisevic 6-3, 2-6, 10-8 (Champions' Tie-break).
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The two former Wimbledon champions went toe-to-toe throughout on the Austrian clay, and Ivanisevic appeared on course for victory when 4-1 and 6-4 up in the Champions’ Tie-Break. But, Stich won six of the last eight points of the match to win through and maintain his 100% record in Group B. He now needs to win his final group match against Marc-Kevin Goellner on Friday to guarantee a place in Saturday’s final.
“It was very tight,” confirmed Stich.
“I’m very happy that I won and it was a good match. We still tried to have some fun out there and enjoy ourselves, and we did, but we also played competitive tennis. I was a little lucky in the end.”
Graz Event Profile | Order of Play
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TIvanisevic lamented the lead he lost in the Champions’ Tie-Break.
“I had 4-1 and didn’t do anything wrong, except maybe one forehand at 6-5. Otherwise it was a great tie-break. He played a great first set, I played a great second. The tie-break was close with some great points. Not too much you can do about it,” he said.
While Pat Rafter had the day off ahead of his Group A deciding clash against 1995 French Open champion Thomas Muster tomorrow, another former World No.1, Marcelo Rios, was victorious. The Chilean was made to fight by Goellner, but eventually prevailed 6-3, 6-7(2), 10-7 (Champions' Tie-break).
Elsewhere, Henri Leconte won an all-French battle against Cedric Pioline 6-4, 6-3.
Matches are played over the best of three sets, with a Champions’ Tie-break (first to 10 points with a clear advantage of two) to decide the winner.
Two weeks ago in Istanbul, Ivanisevic won the Turkcell Legends Cup to move to No.1 in the South African Airways Champions Tour Rankings.
After Graz, the Tour will move on to Algarve, Portugal for the Vale do Lobo Grand Champions CGD (August 5-8).
To go inside the Borg/McEnroe rivalry and watch an exclusive video, click here: http://www.blackrocktourofchampions.com
THE PAT RAFTER INTERVIEW part one
Pat Rafter is back, and we gave fans of the BlackRock Tour of Champions and BBC websites the chance to interview him about anything and everything.
In the first part of his exclusive interview, BlackRockTourOfChampions.com readers asked him where he was when Nadal played Federer in that Wimbledon final two weeks ago, whether his serve-and-volley tennis could take him to the top of the game today, and what he would say if he was offered the Australian Davis Cup captaincy.
Click here to read all of his answers.
Part two of his interview will be published on the BBC Sport website later this week.
Tuesday: Rafter Returns In Style
Wednesday: Rafter To Play Muster In Final Eliminator
