The Delray Beach Open has been very good to Jack Sock. The defending champion picked up another victory in South Florida on Monday, his first of the season, beating Aussie qualifier John-Patrick Smith 6-4, 6-4. Sock, who went 0-2 at the ASB Classic and the Australian Open to start the season, saved all four break points and broke Smith twice during the windy 81-minute first-round contest. “He's very unorthodox, lefty, serve and volleys a lot. Very unorthodox shots: flat, some spin, some flat, slice. Rushes the net a lot, tricky conditions, tricky player, so I'm happy to get through, definitely,” Sock said. [ALSO LIKE] After the match, the World No. 8 was presented with a plaque that coronated him “King...
The calendar might say mid-February, but to Jack Sock, this week's Delray Beach Open feels more like the beginning of the season than the ASB Classic did in January. Sock headed to Auckland still feeling tired from his unpredictable end to 2017. The 25-year-old won the Rolex Paris Masters title and climbed 16 places in the ATP Race To London – from 24th to eighth – to qualify for the Nitto ATP Finals in London for the first time. But the later end to his season – late November instead of early October/early November – threw off Sock's schedule. He flew to New Zealand without his usual off-season training, and it showed on the court. Sock won just one set...
Jack Sock suffered a shock exit at the Australian Open on Monday as Yuichi Sugita booked his place in the second round 6-1, 7-6(4), 5-7, 6-3. Competing as the first American top-eight seed at a Grand Slam championship since Mardy Fish (Australian Open 2012), Sock struggled to reach the heights which saw him triumph at the Rolex Paris Masters in November 2017. Sugita looked impressive throughout with a 75 and 60 per cent success rate on points behind his first and second serves respectively as he recorded his first career Top 10 win (1-5 lifetime). The Japanese No. 2 has now reached the second round at three consecutive Grand Slam events and will face Ivo Karlovic, who dispatched on Laslo...
Continuing our Season In Review Series, ATPWorldTour.com revisits the biggest ATP World Tour comebacks of 2017: 5-tie. Novak Djokovic d. Fernando Verdasco 4-6, 7-6(7), 6-3 - Doha SF Borna Coric d. Philipp Kohlschreiber 5-7, 7-6(3), 7-5 - Marrakech F Five for five at No. 5. A pair of five-match point saving thrillers kick off our list, with both Novak Djokovic and Borna Coric rallying from a set and a break down to dramatically escape from the jaws of defeat. For Djokovic, the drama played out in Doha at the season-opening Qatar ExxonMobil Open, where he dodged five match points against Fernando Verdasco in a second-set tie-break. The Serbian, who was No. 2 in the Emirates...
