The 12-year tour veteran Monfils enters his sixth ATP final with the chance to win just his second title in the last two years.
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Monfils, 29, leads Karlovic, who was aiming to become the tournament’s oldest champion, 3-2 in their head-to-head matches.
Monfils improved to 6-19 in ATP finals, including a 2011 Washington final loss to Radek Stepanek.
But Monfils came through there, converting his seventh break point of the match when Karlovic pushed a forehand volley long.
“The crowd has been fantastic”, Monfils said. He ended Karlovic’s streak of 70 unbroken service games when the Croatian served for the match in the 10th game of the second set. The 6-foot-11 Karlovic regularly held serve at love and blasted aces that left Monfils frozen nearly 15 feet behind the baseline near the “Washington, D.C.” logo or swatting helplessly at the air.
Karlovic blasted a 141mph ace with his hardest serve of the match to save the last break point, then after Monfils sent a backhand wide, Karlovic followed with an overhead smash to claim the first set.
Gael Monfils stamps his mark throughout the brief twenty-one minute second set by winning six consecutive games to eliminate Alexander Zverev.
Monfils dropped his racket and pumped his fist several times, celebrating at the same tennis center that Noah and Ashe did so many decades ago. In the end, it all came down to those final few points of the second set and the start of the third, and Ivo wasn’t helped by the fact he won 5 points more in the end.
At 4-all, Karlovic secured a service break after Monfils let a volley sail long. That contributed to Monfils getting the key break for 2-1.
Standing in Monfils’ way of the title was big serving Ivo Karlovic.
“If it was a normal match I would have won it right there”, Karlovic said.
“I grew up with those names”, Monfils said. “I tried to be a bit slower than to aggress him [Alexander Zverev]…” Monfils finished with 16 aces and seven double faults, while Karlovic had 28 aces and four double faults to finish with a tournament-leading 108 aces. He’s very aggressive in the return.
Karlovic then was a single point from victory at 6-5 in the ensuing tiebreaker, but a 116 miles per hour serve by Monfils produced a backhand return that sailed long. Karlovic takes the eighth game 40-15 to reach set point.
But it was his opponent who instead bucked an unwanted personal trend, recovering from losing the opening set to win a final for the first time in his career, overcoming the Croatian 5-7 7-6 (8-6) 6-4. The big serving Karlovic lives up to his reputation with 8 aces compared to 3 against Steve Johnson.
Karlovic broke on an overhead smash for a 5-4 lead in the second set, but again handed Monfils triple break point only to save them all, this time with an overhead smash, a second-serve ace and a backhand volley victor.
Johnson once again wins the first game of the second set, as Karlovic responds in the same fashion as during the set opener with three straight wins.
In the decider, Monfils pounced on Karlovic by breaking serve in game three and holding on for victory. Karlovic got things back to deuce but then faced another break point.
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Karlovic, a victor last week at the Hall of Fame Tennis Championships in Newport, Rhode Island, came close to becoming the oldest man to win back-to-back ATP singles tournaments since 43-year-old Ken Rosewall in 1973. Karlovic’s tactic of playing Steve Johnson near the net proved to be very effective in neutralizing the elite-level American.
