US Open: Benoit Paire, a troubled Frenchman, was easily dispatched by Cameron Norrie, who proved far too powerful for him, and Dan Evans, who joined him after a brilliant performance.
Despite having one of the best backhands in the game, Paire is not lacking in talent. However, his effort has sometimes been questioned, and in the first and third sets in the hot weather, he scarcely seemed to try.
After a very close second set, Norrie dropped just 17 games overall in the two sets that followed, completing the match with scores of 6-0 7-6 (7-1) 6-0 in one hour and 40 minutes.
The British No. 1 is competing as a top-eight seed at a Grand Slam for the first time, and after reaching the Wimbledon semifinals, he is unquestionably a title contender.
Norrie was concentrated from the outset, whereas Paire committed 16 unforced errors in a first set that lasted less than 20 minutes, which is twice as many as the points he won. Finding two tennis players with more disparate approaches to their profession would be difficult.
In the second set, things went differently. Following a small delay caused by a fan who suddenly passed out in the audience, Paire broke Norrie’s serve, leaving him serving for the set at 5-3.
However, Norrie immediately broke back, won the tie-break, and quickly finished the job while Paire was barely jogging around the court in the third.
“It’s tricky, especially with how Benoit plays,” Norrie said when asked about playing against someone who at times did not appear to be trying to win.
“Because he looks like he’s not really there and he can come up with a few good shots and a few big returns. In that third set, he was love-30 a couple of times, 15-30, and that’s when he’s very dangerous. I think he’s an exciting player to watch and he’s a really nice guy.”
He later added: “It’s unfortunate, I think he played a little bit too quick, and at the end of the day I went out and did my job.”
Norrie, who increased his win-loss record to 42-19 for the season, will next take on Portuguese Joao Sousa, who prevailed over American Mackenzie McDonald in a roller-coaster match, winning 1-6 7-6 (7-4) 7-6 (7-4) 6-3.
For tennis tournament, tennis championship, tennis live score, US Open, tennis court, tennis live update and other tennis news follow livematchupdatesnews.com.
