Music: {allcanada} Polansky stuns Monaco

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

{allcanada} Polansky stuns Monaco

NEW YORK -- Canada's Peter Polansky earned his first Grand Slam main draw victory of his career Tuesday, knocking off No. 30 seed Juan Monaco of Argentina at the U.S. Open.

The Thornhill, Ont., native defeated Monaco 6-2, 7-6 (5), 6-3 in the opening round in front of about 1,000 fans at Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.

"I started to serve really well near the end," said Polansky after the match. "I knew if I played well and focused that I could do it. This means a lot, especially beating two top-35 guys in the past two weeks. That's huge for me."

The 2006 US Open junior finalist converted on three-of-five break point chances in the set and six-for-nine for the match.

With the first break point opportunity of the third set for Polansky, he returned a Monaco kick serve around the net post, but in for a winner. Polansky then calmly served out at-love to take a 3-1 lead. The Canadian broke Monaco again to close out the match.

After trailing 2-5 in the second set tiebreak, Polansky reeled off five straight points and took the commanding lead.

Polansky is having a strong finish to the summer hard court season, including a win over world No. 15 Jergen Melzer of Austria in the opening round of Rogers Cup in Toronto and earned three victories to qualify for the final Grand Slam of the season in New York.

Canada's top-ranked male singles player will next face either American James Blake or Kristof Vliegen of Belgium in Thursday's second round on Thursday.

Rebecca Marino of Vancouver will play third-seeded American Venus Williams on Wednesday.