Without losing a set, but also without top form, Olympic champion Alexander Zverev reached the second round at the Australian Open.
With 7: 6 (7: 3), 6: 1, 7: 6 (7: 1), the title candidate prevailed on Monday in Melbourne despite weaker phases in the German duel with Daniel Altmaier.
After 2:38 hours, the 24-year-old used his fifth match point and rounded off a successful first day for the German tennis men.
“You will not always play your best tennis.
It was a good match for me to get into the tournament and hopefully the next one will be better," said Zverev after the evening's performance in the Rod Laver Arena and admitted: "Not much went according to plan, except that I won."
Zverev as a beneficiary of the Djokovic cause?
In the fight for a place in the third round, the number three in the world will face John Millman on Wednesday.
Zverev has played against the Australian twice so far, won twice - but at the French Open 2019 he only fought his way through in five sets.
But Zverev has the greatest ambitions for Down Under: In just under two weeks, the Hamburger would be only too happy to celebrate his first Grand Slam title in the Rod Laver Arena.
After Melbourne record champion Novak Djokovic was forced to leave Australia, Zverev is the best-placed professional in the top half of the table - and could benefit from the court decision against Djokovic.
In the first encounter with Altmaier, Zverev found the match difficult.
Anyone who thought the 2020 Melbourne semi-finalists would dominate the game from the start was wrong.
Only in the tie-break was the German number one the better player – and deserved a win.
Altmaier is 87th in the world rankings, surprised by reaching the round of 16 at the French Open in 2020 and is now appearing at the Australian Open for the first time.
In the second set, Zverev was in a hurry: to make it 1-0 and 3-0, he took the service games from his opponent who was a year younger.
When he made an unnecessary mistake and Altmaier shortened it to 1:4, he dropped the racket, but shortly afterwards got the next break.
Hanfmann now against Nadal
In the third set, the 2020 US Open finalist endured a tricky situation as he conceded a break and was 3-2 behind.
But Zverev avoided a longer tennis evening that would have caused a set loss: He missed three breakballs in a row, but equalized to 4: 4 - and characteristically shook his head.
With wins at the start, Dominik Koepfer, who progressed despite arm problems, as well as Oscar Otte and Yannick Hanfmann provided bright spots.
Hanfmann in particular can now look forward to a real highlight thanks to his first win in the main draw of a Grand Slam tournament: the duel with Spanish top star Rafael Nadal will secure him a match in one of the top places.
"I said last time, I'm going in there to win and then I was pretty, not beaten up, but pretty much shot down," said the Karlsruher, referring to his encounter with Nadal at the French Open 2019.
Maybe this time he'll say he wants to play "great balls" and "tight sentences".
Smoothly 6: 2, 6: 3, 6: 2 he asserted himself in round one against the Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis, who was in good form recently.
"I still have the images in my head," he enthused about the atmosphere: "We came onto the pitch and it was deafening noise.
We both looked around and thought, "What's going on here?" It felt like a Davis Cup atmosphere."
Andrea Petkovic formed a contrast to the happy Hanfmann.
"It's just a terrible day for me today," the Darmstadt native complained after her chanceless performance and 2: 6, 0: 6 against the Czech French Open winner Barbora Krejcikova.
“Today was the first day in two months that went like this.
But that just goes to show that the tennis gods never cease to amaze.”
Because Tatjana Maria also lost 4: 6, 6: 7 (2: 7) against the Greek Maria Sakkari despite a good performance, only Angelique Kerber can prevent the women from being completely disillusioned.
In any case, there were only three German players in the main field.
Kerber intervened in the tournament on Tuesday.