Del Potro wins an ATP title after 2 years 9 months

10/24/2016

Juan Martin del Potro completed his comeback from injury with a straight-sets victory over Jack Sock in the Stockholm Open final. The Argentine, who came back to ATP Tour circle for the first time at Delray Beach in February after being on the sidelines for almost a year, won the game 7-5, 6-1.

De Potro won the US Open title in 2009 beating Rafael Nadal en route and Roger Federer in the final, but since then, his career has been plagued with injury after undergoing three wrist surgeries in five years that left him contemplating retirement.

But the Argentine, now 28, justified the faith some fans have kept in him by winning is first title in over 33 months. Del Potro beat Grigor Dimitrov, Ivo Karlovic and John Isner en route to the final, and along with Sock, they were four of the top five seeds in the tournament.

“This means something very big to me. After two years with many problems with my wrist, coming back and playing at this level and winning another trophy at this unbelievable tournament is great. I’m so happy to win the final and show my best tennis," said the player after the match.

“The conditions are good for me to play and I beat all the guys in two sets and played really good during the whole tournament.”

Sock and del Potro kept winning games on their own serves in the first set as the score reached 5-5. But the Argentine broke Sock's serve comfortably taking a lead of 6-5 as the first set neared its conclusion.

Del Potro held on to his serve and started the second set in a flurry rushing to a 2-0 lead after he broke Sock again in the very first game of the set. Sock won the next game to make it 2-1, but that the last time the Australian won a game in the match as del Potro won the next four games in a row, breaking his opponent twice to secure his victory.

“It was a tough match. His serve is massive and very tough to read, which put more pressure on my serve. He just played well today. I’ve had a long week and it might have caught up with me a bit,” Sock said.

Del Potro seems to have found a new lease of life after returning from injury. A silver medal at the Rio Olympics in August was followed by a Davis Cup win over Great Britain where he downed Andy Murray to set up a final against Croatia in November.

Since his comeback, he has already won against Novak Djokovic, Stan Wawrinka, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray and now having secured his first title since 2014, del Porto looks like he is finally back.

Del Potro wins an ATP title after 2 years 9 months

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