Stefanos Tsitsipas has yet to really figure out how to play on grass, and this year didn't offer anything different, as he lost early at the 2024 Halle Open.
Tsitsipas has a trophy on grass, but he's not a very good player on the surface. Technically, his tennis could be suited well for the low-bouncing courts, but there's just something that isn't working on his game on the green surface.
For example, his backhand return gets picked on regularly by serves, and it doesn't work as well as he looks on clay. His first match on grass in 2024 was a win, but he downed a player who is not even close to the Top 100 and only did in two tie-breaks.
That sort of level would not be enough for Jan Lennard Struff, and it wasn't as he was beaten easily in two sets. The German knows his way around grass because he has a powerful serve and is also comfortable on the net.
His tennis has also been pretty strong in recent years, so he wasn't as big of an outsider on the grass court in Halle as he would have been somewhere else. His first break came relatively early in the first set and obviously proved more than enough.
He calmly kept his serve after that, serving out the set to win it 6-4. Tsitsipas never came close to a break point and generally created very little pressure on his opponent's serve.
The same scenario happened in the second set, as Struff once again took a break relatively early. There was even less pressure on Struff's serve this time around, as he once again failed to create any break chances.
After breaking his opponent's serve, Struff once again easily cruised to the finish line, with the final score being 6-4, 6-4. The German dropped only five points on his first serve in the match.
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