The last step was missing! Jiri Vesely lost in the final of the ATP 500 tournament

Unfortunately Jiří Veselý did not add another big scalp. Very unexpectedly, he reached the final of the ATP 500 tournament in Dubai. On his way to the finals he faced four players in the top 30.

In the final, the world No. 7 Andrey Rublyov of Russia awaited him. He dominated the indoor tournament in Marseille a week ago. He also won the doubles tournament in the French city. It was obvious that Vesely was not quite there physically.

After all, he had to go through the qualification where he struggled in the first round with the 421st ranked player Habib. But then came a great run. First, he made it to the main stage when he beat Australian Popyrin.

Then he beat Marin Cilic in the first round of the bracket, and Roberto Bautista in the second round. In the quarterfinals, he blew Novak Djokovic out of the world number one position and became the third player in history to have a positive record against a Serbian tennis player. In the semi-finals, he took on Canadian Denis Shapovalov after a three-hour battle.

Rubljov showed quality tennis, with sure and hard shots that gave Vesely big problems. The native of Pribram lost his second serve in the first set, which made him lose the first set – 3-6.

Unfortunately, the second set didn’t start well for Vesely either as he lost his first serve. However, the Czech national player, who is not part of the Davis Cup team in Argentina, managed to get into the match at least for a while, when he took away the Russian’s serve in the sixth game. But then the world No. 7 Rubljov took it back on another Vesely serve and calmly brought the match to a winning end – 4-6.

One of the best tournaments in the career of the 28-year-old Czech tennis player did not end with a victorious ending, but it made a great advertisement for Czech tennis and silenced the big critics of Vesely. “Congratulations on the win and I don’t understand how he can make two finals two weeks in a row and win. That’s great.”

” I believe this week marks a change in my career. It has to. I want to take the positive things that I’ve been able to do here. D

i hope I can build on that in the season and have a great year,” said Vesely, whose great performance at the Dubai tournament will move him back into the elite 100 (74th place) and make him the Czech number one again. His next tournament is the week of March 7 when he will be seeded at Roseto, Italy.

Sources: ATP, Twitter