French Open: Karlovic oldest winner for 45 years

Croatia’s Ivo Karlovic has become the oldest man to win a match at the French Open for 45 years as he beat Spain’s fellow veteran Feliciano Lopez in a first-round duel.

Karlovic, who turned 40 in February, won 7-6(4) 7-5 6-7(7) 7-5 in a match featuring players with a combined age of 77 – the oldest in a Grand Slam in the professional era.

He became the oldest man to win a Grand Slam match since Australian great Ken Rosewall did so at age 44 in the 1978 Australian Open.

The last player to contest a Grand Slam singles match having turned 40 was American Jimmy Connors at the US Open in 1992.

Croatian giant Karlovic fired down 35 aces on his way to a second-round clash against Australian youngster Jordan Thompson.

Big win for the big man!

???????? @ivokarlovic defeats Feliciano Lopez 7-6(4), 7-5, 6-7(9), 7-5. | #RG19 pic.twitter.com/kM9P7453lr

— ATP Tour (@ATP_Tour) May 28, 2019

He was the first man in his 40s to compete in a Grand Slam singles match for 27 years, but the evergreen Karlovic made light of his age to outlast left-hander Lopez.

“It means a lot. Even though it’s in the record books as the oldest one, at least it’s in the record books, so I like it,” Karlovic said of playing his fellow long-survivor.

“I was out for almost two months, so I am really happy that I was able to win today.”

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Karlovic, ranked world No.94, had decided against playing any claycourt tournaments in the build-up to Roland Garros where he has never gone past the third round.

But there was nothing rusty about his serve, not giving Lopez a sniff of a break in the opening two sets.

He took the first set on a tiebreak but did not engineer a break point on the Lopez serve until pouncing with his opponent 5-6 down in the second set.

Almost inevitably the third set went to another tiebreak and when Lopez missed a routine volley at 5-5 it handed Karlovic a match point, only for him to be denied by a lucky backhand return that left him floundering at the net.

A fifth set loomed when Lopez led 5-2 in the fourth set but Karlovic rattled off five straight games to move through.

In a performance of old-school skills he won 65 points at the net.

“Right now I’m just happy with any match that I win,” Karlovic said.

“Even if it’s against older guys or kids, whatever. I just like to win.”