Taylor
Fritz analyzed his loss to
Andrey Rublev in the semifinals of the
Madrid Open
and stated that the clay density on the central court was different from the
other courts in the tournament. The world No. 13 played on all three stadiums
at Caja Magica and considered the conditions of the main stadium to be slower.
Rublev
took only 72 minutes to reach his fifth final of a Masters 1000 tournament in
his career. Fritz started the match with an early break, but he couldn't break
his opponent's serve again and ended his journey in Madrid being soundly
defeated by the Russian.
Challenges
on Center Court: Taylor Fritz discussed court conditions
The
American played his first two rounds against
Luciano Darderi and
Sebastian Baez
on Court 3, both with easy straight-set victories. In the round of 16, he moved
to the Arantxa Sanchez Stadium, the second in importance, and also secured the
win against Hubert Hurkacz with a score of 7-6, 6-4.
His
subsequent matches were on the Court Manolo Santana in the quarterfinals
against
Francisco Cerundolo (6-1, 3-6, 6-3), and two days later, he fell to the
Russian world No. 8 with a score of 4-6, 3-6.
"When
I was playing on I guess Arantxa Sanchez [Vicario] and Stadium 3. I feel like,
for sure, it's faster in there it's bouncing higher in there. Center court's
definitely slower and it was pretty slippery as well," Fritz said.
Fritz achieved his 250th victory at ATP Tour level in the quarterfinals against Cerundolo
"I
wish I would have served a lot better. I've been serving well all week, I
didn't serve well and I just felt very, like I said, I felt like the court was,
I know for a fact that there's not as much clay on Center than all the other
courts," he added.
"I
can literally, when I'm taking little steps I can hear my feet squeaking
because it's hitting like the hard surface underneath the clay... I wanted to take
some pretty, like, aggressive steps to get back into the court I was just
slipping a lot," he added.