Anderson triumphs in Aus battle to fourth round
Kevin Anderson put up a valiant fight to make it through to the fourth round of the Australian Open in Melbourne on Friday beating Edouard Roger-Vasselin 3-6, 4-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7/5) 7-5.
Kevin Anderson. Image courtesy of Facebook
The 19th seed fought back against the unseeded Frenchman after being two sets down in a match which lasted just under four hours.
Anderson won the third set and came back from two games down in the fourth to force a tie-breaker and take the match into a fifth set.
Roger-Vasselin broke Anderson’s serve early in the fifth but Anderson kept up the battle to eventually level the games at 5-5 on his way to victory.
Anderson scraped through the first round of the tournament, beating Czech Republic’s 82nd-ranked Jiri Vesely 2-6, 6-7 (4/7), 6-4, 6-4, 6-4.
He had an easier time of it in the second round, beating Austria’s Dominic Thiem 6-4, 6-3, 6-4 on Wednesday.
Anderson will play his nemesis, the seventh-seeded Czech Tomas Berdych, in the next round.
The pair have met on nine occasions during the last two years including at the 2012 and 2013 Australian Open where Berdych came out on top in all nine matches.
– Sapa
