PARIS –
If Félix Auger-Aliassime was sweaty after his second-round singles tennis match at the Paris Olympics, it was mostly due to the overwhelming heat on the Simonne Mathieu court rather than the challenge offered by his opponent.
For Leylah Annie Fernandez, the drops of perspiration on her face camouflaged a few tears.
Auger-Aliassime dominated Germany’s Maximilian Marterer with a decisive 6-0, 6-1 victory in 64 minutes. On the women’s side, Germany’s Angelique Kerber won 6-4, 6-3 against Fernandez in their third-round match at Roland Garros.
Montreal’s Auger-Aliassime won the first 10 games of his match before the crowd came alive when Marterer, who is ranked 116th in the world, finally made it onto the scoreboard in the second set.
The 23-year-old Canadian did not face break point in the match, as was the case in his first-round match against Marcos Giron of the United States, and scored 57 points to Marterer’s 30.
“I was able to take control of the rallies,” Auger-Aliassime said.
His third-round opponent will be fourth-seed Daniil Medvedev, who dominated Austria’s Sebastian Ofner 6-2, 6-2 on Tuesday. Medvedev, a Russian national, is competing as a neutral athlete in Paris.
Medvedev has won each of the seven matches he’s had with Auger-Aliassime so far, but they’ve all taken place on hard surface courts.
“For me, it would be ideal to face off against him here, on a clay court,” Auger-Aliassime said. “It would be a nice place to win against him, at the Olympic Games.”
Auger-Aliassime was also in action later on Tuesday in a first-round mixed doubles match with Ottawa’s Gabriela Dabrowski. The Canadian duo defeated Britain’s Heather Watson and Joe Salisbury 7-5, 4-6, (10-3).
Earlier, Fernandez was eliminated from the women’s singles competition in what she called one of her worst matches to date.
“I’m very disappointed with how I played,” she said, struggling to hold back her emotions. “I made a lot of forced errors, a lot of unforced errors. I didn’t play a very smart match. Angie saw the open door and went in.”
Kerber picked up her seventh break of the match to go up 4-2 in the second set, then clinched the victory on her first match point with a forehand winner. The 36-year-old German has announced that she’ll retire after the Games.
Fernandez, from Laval, Que., made the most of her opportunities with four breaks on five chances, but her struggle to hold serve proved costly.
“Normally, I serve well. Today, I didn’t serve very well,” she said. “It was one of my worst matches. … There were many things that didn’t work at the same time. I was trying to stay positive in my mind but I didn’t find the answers today.”
The Olympics aren’t over for the 21-year-old Canadian, however. She will team with Dabrowski in a women’s doubles second-round match later this week.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 30, 2024.