Damage a car on the court or run away from practice with Nadal. Those were Stefan Kozlov’s last few weeks

Images of an angry Alexander Zverev being expelled from a tournament in Acapulco, Mexico, have been circulating around the world. American Stefan Kozlov had equally bizarre experiences at tournaments in Delray Beach and Mexico.

Kozlov is probably known only to the world’s greatest tennis connoisseurs. The American with Russian roots is a former world junior number two. He was predicted to have a great future, a potential that he has not yet been able to fulfill very fully.

However, he has been doing very well in the last two seasons and he proved it by winning against the 33rd player in the world, Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov. But there were several situations before the match that made life difficult for the American.

All in good order. Last week, Kozlov entered the quarterfinals of the ATP tournament in Delray Beach, USA, against his compatriot Tommy Paul. But a far greater opponent than Paul himself was Kozlov’s BMW car, which was parked in a corner of the court and which will be awarded to the winner of the tournament.

Kozlov plays far behind the baseline on his return and therefore almost crashed into the car several times. The first time he failed, the second time he left a mark on the door, which he caused with his racket.

A similar case also happened to world number two Daniil Medvedev, who crashed into a camera that was too close to the court at the Cincinnati tournament. “Players should be safe while playing,” Russian Andrey Rublyov said angrily of Kozlov’s situation.

Kozlov lost his match against Paul and moved on to Acapulco, Mexico, where he had to go through qualifying. But he was eliminated in the second round by Germany’s Otto. So he went to the sea, spent the whole day on the beach, but then had an accident on his scooter.

“I had problems with the jet ski, I tipped it over and crashed into a cliff, I swam away from the rocks for thirty minutes,” recounted Kozlov, who then went to the venue where he was to train with Rafael Nadal.

On the court during a practice match, the Spaniard’s racket string snapped, so Kozlov went to check his phone in his bag during a break. And he wasn’t surprised. The organisers had put him back in the competition as a lucky loser instead of his compatriot Cressy.

The confused faces of Kozlov and Nadal were caught on video by friends present.

But that wasn’t the end of the crazy story. Kozlov had only half an hour to move to the court, where the 33rd player of the world Grigor Dimitrov was waiting for him. But the American put on an incredible performance.

He won the first set in a tiebreak and was serving for the win in the second set but the fatigue of a hard day kicked in when he lost the second set and just fell to the floor in frustrated convulsions. At the beginning of the decisive third set, he finally used all his strength to defend his own serve, which he held until the end of the match.

He defeated Dimitrov 7-6 (8), 5-7, 6-3 to advance to the next round. Rafa, sorry for the interruption in practice. And to make the story complete, the spider has brought both of them together for another match.

The current world number one dominated the match and gave Kozlov a canary in the first set. The second was also dominated by the Spaniard by 6-3.

Sources: TennisTV, Livesport