Garcia Lopez stuns Wawrinka in 1st round of French Open

Spain's Guillermo Garcia Lopez on Monday pulled off a big upset, stunning the 2017 French Open finalist Stanislas Wawrinka of Switzerland 6-2, 3-6, 4-6, 7-6 (7-5), 6-3 in the opening round of the Grand Slam event held on clay court.

The Spaniard, world No. 67, was more solid from the baseline than Wawrinka, a former top 10 player, in a match that lasted three and a half hours, reports Efe.

Wawrinka, currently world No. 30, has slipped from the top level of play that brought him to the 2017 final, where he lost in straight sets to Spain's Rafael Nadal.

The Swiss player committed a total of 72 unforced errors, while struggling on serve.

After falling a set down, Wawrinka, who underwent a knee surgery in 2017, seemed to be on his way to the second round, as he made the most of the lone break point he created to draw level, and repeated the scenario in the next set to take a 2-1 lead.

However, in the pivotal fourth set, Wawrinka squandered four out of five break points he created and conceded his own serve once.

Wawrinka probably lamented these missed opportunities as the set went to a tie-break that Garcia Lopez won.

Garcia Lopez did not face a single break point in the decider and created six break points, two of which were enough to seal his fourth career win over Wawrinka out of 11 matches.

Next up for Garcia Lopez is Russia's Karen Khachanov, who defeated Austria's Andreas Haider Maurer.

--IANS

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