Patrombon wins 1st game in French Open junior

Jeson Patrombon claimed Miki Jankovic as his first victim in a Grand Slam event beating the Serbian netter, 6-3, 6-1, in the French Open Junior Championships in Paris. Patrombon played aggressively against Jankovic, the younger brother of world No. 4 Jelena Jankovic, as the 17-year-old Filipino netter proved to be too much against his opponent who is 56 places below him in the International Tennis Federation (ITF) junior rankings. Patrombon is currently the highest-ranked Filipino junior netter at 43rd in the world while Jankovic is at 99th spot. "Jankovic is very consistent with his ground strokes and plays with heavy high looping topspin balls, which is very effective on clay," said Patrombon’s coach, Mike Tecson. "So our strategy is not to engage Jankovic in long rallies from the baseline and instead took the initiative on the rallies combining it with an attacking net game to put more pressure on him." The unseeded Patrombon will next face ninth seed Duilio Beretta of Peru in the second round with the winner moving battling No. 6 Denis Kudla of the United States. Beretta, ranked 11th in the world, eliminated wild card entry Gregoire Barrere of France, 6-7 (5), 6-3, 8-6, while Kudla scored a 7-6 (8), 6-3 win over Micke Kontinen of Finland. "Our goal was to get our first win in a Grand Slam event which is so hard to do because everybody is tough and all the best players in the world are here. We have accomplished our first goal. Now anything can happen and (Jeson’s) confidence is growing," added Tecson. Patrombon earned 30 ITF points with his first round victory in the Grade A tournament. But he failed to bring his success in the doubles event as he and teammate Ahmed Triki of Tunisia suffered a 4-6, 6-1, 14-12 loss to France’s Romain Arneodo and Mathias Bourgue. Francis Casey Alcantara is the other Filipino netter playing in the French Open and will see action in the boys’ doubles. He and Fil-Am teamater Raymond Sarmiento will face Filip Horansky and Jozef Kovalik of the Slovak Republic. – JVP, GMANews.TV