Tsitsipas Saves Three Set Points to Beat Kovacevic in Almaty

By Taki Panos

Some matches are decided by the better player. Others are decided by who blinks first in a tiebreak. Stefanos Tsitsipas did not blink. He saved three set points in a long first-set tiebreak and went on to beat Aleksandar Kovacevic 7-6(9), 3-6, 6-3 in the first round of the Almaty Open on Tuesday, October 20, 2026, as the ATP Tour and Gazzetta reported. The match at the indoor ATP 250 event in Kazakhstan lasted about two hours, per the ATP and Sport24.

For anyone just tuning in to the tennis season, Tsitsipas is the former world No. 3 and a 13-time ATP Tour champion, according to the ATP, and he is the seventh seed in Almaty, per the official draw and the tournament's own report. He arrived in Kazakhstan straight from a strong week in China, where he picked up his 400th tour-level win and beat Taylor Fritz before Daniil Medvedev ended his Shanghai run 6-4, 7-5 in the round of 16.

Kovacevic was a tricky draw for an opener. The American, born just weeks after Tsitsipas in 1998 according to Tennis.com, also plays with a one-handed backhand, which is why the ATP called this an all-one-hander battle. It was their third meeting. Tsitsipas won the first in Los Cabos in 2024, 7-6(1), 6-3, while Kovacevic won the second in Winston-Salem this August, 6-3, 7-6(1), as Gazzetta and Tennis.com both list. So this was not a free pass. It was a rematch.

The first set stayed on serve from start to finish. Tsitsipas held from 0-30 in the fifth game for 3-2, and Kovacevic saved two break points in the next game, the first of them with an ace, to level at 3-3, Gazzetta's play-by-play showed. From there the Greek held comfortably and won the 11th game with a cross-court forehand winner for 6-5. Kovacevic held again, and the set went to a tiebreak that neither man seemed willing to lose.

That tiebreak was the match in miniature. Kovacevic led 3-0 and 4-2 and then served his way to a double set point at 6-4 with another ace, per Gazzetta. A missed volley and an unforced error later, it was 6-6. Tsitsipas could not convert his own first set point at 7-6, both players let another chance slip to make it 9-9, and the Greek finally closed it 11-9 on his third set point, Gazzetta reported. The ATP counted three set points saved.

The second set swung the other way. Tsitsipas faced 0-40 in the sixth game, and Kovacevic broke on his first chance to lead 4-2, according to Gazzetta, before serving out the set 6-3. Here is the remarkable part: that was the only break point Tsitsipas faced all match, according to Tennis.com's statistics, and Kovacevic took it. One loose game cost him a set.

The decider belonged to Tsitsipas. He had an early look at a break that slipped away, per Gazzetta, then earned a double break point at 2-1 and converted with a winner for 3-1. A love hold made it 4-1, per Gazzetta, and he kept the lead at 5-2 before serving it out 6-3 in the ninth game. It was a calm finish to a nervy afternoon.

The numbers back up the story of a serving contest. Kovacevic hit 13 aces to seven for Tsitsipas, according to Tennis.com and the tournament's report, and both men held 14 of their 15 service games. Tsitsipas won more than 80 percent of the points behind his first serve, per the same sources, and converted one of his four break points. Asked by the ATP what made the difference, he gave a two-word answer: "My persistence."

He went on to explain it. "I was trying to stay in the match and just be patient," Tsitsipas told the ATP. "He was serving exceptionally well today, it was really frustrating being on the other side of the court having to return. It wasn't an easy match." He was generous about his opponent, too, saying Kovacevic has "improved a lot in the past couple of months" and adding: "He's a great player and I'm a big fan of his game."

The bigger picture is a season that has turned around since the summer. The ATP has Tsitsipas at 35-22 for 2026, with 18 of those wins coming since the start of his title run in Gstaad in mid-July. He beat Raphael Collignon 6-4, 6-7(3), 6-3 in that final on July 19 for his first title since Dubai in 2025, as the ATP and the Gstaad tournament both reported. Kazakhstan has been kind to him before as well: he reached the final of this event in 2022, when it was held in Astana, the tournament noted.

Next up is an emotional night for the home crowd. Tsitsipas faces 38-year-old Mikhail Kukushkin, a home wild card playing the final tournament of his career, according to the ATP and Gazzetta. Kukushkin beat Greece's Stefanos Sakellaridis 7-6(4), 7-6(3) on Monday, which ended hopes of an all-Greek second round, per Gazzetta and the ATP results. Tsitsipas leads their head-to-head 4-0, the ATP said, and Gazzetta has the match set for Wednesday, October 21, at 5:30 PM Greek time.

My take: this was the kind of win that matters more in October than it looks on paper. Tsitsipas did not play his cleanest tennis, and he lost a set to one sloppy service game. But he stayed patient through a tiebreak where he was two points from losing the set, and he raised his level in the third. A season ago that match might have slipped away. Now he is finding ways through. Kukushkin will have the crowd, but Tsitsipas has the form and the record.

If he gets past Kukushkin, the quarterfinals could bring second seed Luciano Darderi, whom he beat 6-3, 6-4 in Shanghai, or James Duckworth, who beat Miomir Kecmanovic 6-4, 6-3, according to the official draw and the ATP results. Fourth seed Andrey Rublev is in the same half, while top seed and defending champion Medvedev is in the other, per the ATP. It has been a good autumn for Greek tennis, with Maria Sakkari reaching the Wuhan quarterfinals. Keep an eye on our Greek Sports section for every result. One round down. Next, a farewell in Almaty.

Sources: ATP Tour, Gazzetta, Sport24, Tennis.com, Almaty Open, EFG Swiss Open Gstaad.

Image: Stefanos Tsitsipas at the Swiss Indoors Basel 2024 by Skyscraper2010, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).