Cincinnati Masters 2019: Denis Shapovalov loses in straight sets to Lucas Pouille

Rudi Schuller

Cincinnati Masters 2019: Denis Shapovalov loses in straight sets to Lucas Pouille image

Denis Shapovalov's stay in Ohio came to an early end when he fell 6-4, 6-4 to France's Lucas Pouille in the second round of the Cincinnati Masters on Wednesday.

Pouille showed from the first game that he would give the World No. 34 a tough match, spending nearly five minutes and taking four opportunities before breaking the Canadian's serve and grab a 1-0 lead. The Frenchman wasted little time winning the next game to go up 2-0, putting Shapovalov under pressure early in a bit of a facsimile of the start to the 20-year-old's three-set comeback victory from a day earlier.

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But while Shapovalov put up much more of a fight in Wednesday's opening frame than he did on Tuesday against Joao Sousa, the youngster couldn't find a breakthrough against the World No. 31.

Shapovalov hit 10 aces in the first set alone but ultimately couldn't recover from the match-opening break point won by his opponent. The second set saw Shapovalov hit another pair of aces — Pouille had none over the course of the entire match — and build a 67-54 overall advantage in first-serve percentage, but Pouille shrugged off the big serves en route to an impressive victory in which the 25-year-old didn't allow a single break point opportunity over the two sets.

Shapovalov hasn't advanced past the second round since his quarterfinal defeat to eventual champion Benoit Paire at the Lyon Open in May.

Rudi Schuller