One down two qualifying ties to go (hopefully) for Edinburgh’s Jacob Fearnley in his quest to reach the first round proper of the US Open tennis.
The former Colinton junior defeated Tenerife’s Roberto Carballes Baeno 7-6, 6-3 to progress but for the first set at least it was a masterclass in hanging in and staring down adversity.
Much of this came in a game where Jacob presented his rival with twosuccessive set points and three altogether having served one of his seven double faults.
No problem. He rescued the situation with a series of aces in a set without any service breaks.
Enter the tie-break and Jacob raced away into a lead leaving the Spaniard shaking his head and wondering how it had got to this.
Indeed such was the quality of Jacob’s powerful forehand and net approach to dispatch a series of volleys it wouldn’t be the first time that Carballes Baeno was left looking bemused.
That he was able to remain competitive even from 0-3 in the second set was down to Jacob’s 50 unforced errors.
Let me repeat: 50 unforced errors!
That profligacy cannot continue if the Scot is to progress up the rankings – he is currently just inside the top 100 having been No 49 – but for the moment it is job done.
What a player we have though when, as predicted, he start to put it all together and produce performances based more on consistency of serve and shot making which at times reached genius level.
