Marcos Giron bagged one of his biggest wins to date at the European Open in Antwerp when he beat first seed David Goffin.
Thanks to a 6-3, 7-5 victory over home favorite Goffin, the American was rewarded with a place in the European open quarter-finals.
The world number 94, who underwent right hip surgery in December 2015 and left hip surgery in February 2016, secured 10 of the 13 break points he faced in order to bag a first win over world number 14 Goffin.
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The 27-year-old broke the host’s serve on five occasions, thereby dispelling the host’s hopes of winning the tournament held at home to the European Open.
“I don’t know about the operation so after two hip surgeries, it was amazing to see him move and see how strong his leg was and moving left and right,” said Goffin.
“You can’t see that he has had surgery more than once so I think he met a good surgeon. Then he moves well and is strong that you can see that his legs are really strong and he is really solid from the back of the pitch. So I’m happy to see him playing his best game after undergoing quite a difficult operation.”
The home player who was runner-up to the 2017 ATP Finals season is known for his slick baseline play, but he made unexpected mistakes throughout the match, which gave Marcos Giron even more confidence.
The world number 14 had to come from behind twice in the second set but he made too many mistakes and forced to give up after 1 hour 40 minutes.
“I struggled throughout the game and I think there was a lot of ups and downs,” admitted Goffin.
“Sometimes I played a nice game, played well and was aggressive. But sometimes I get really down with three unforced errors for no reason. If I can reduce a few mistakes, the match will probably be better. “
Giron’s best ever win came at Indian Wells in the 2019 season when he beat then world number 24 Alex De Minaur. He has a chance to beat De Minaur again when they meet in this week’s European Open quarter-finals.
