Difficult draw for Haase and Griekspoor

The draw for the Libéma Open revealed that Robin Haase will have to play against Ivo Karlovic in the first round and Tallon Griekspoor will meet Stefanos Tsitsipas.

Haase and Karlovic only had one individual match before on the grass courts of Rosmalen, in 2015. Then the player from The Hague was too strong for the power server from Croatia in the quarter-final.

‘Whichever way you look at it, it is a difficult draw. I would have preferred to play somebody else, but this is the way it is with a draw,’ Haase said after the publication of the order of play.

When asked if he, the world’s number 44, would prepare differently for the match against the 2.11m long finalist of 2017, Haase answered: ‘I will not prepare myself any different than normal. The only thing will be, maybe, that my trainer will serve some balls standing on a chair for five minutes, but we normally do that anyway.’

Griekspoor was linked to Tsitsipas, who received a wildcard. The 19-year-old Greek has a very good season and climbed no less than 160 places on the world ranking and is currently the number 39.

It will be Tsitsipas’s, who is seeded 5^th, debut in the main event in Rosmalen. It will be Griekspoor’s second performance with a wildcard. Last year he was defeated in the first round by Vasek Pospisil.

Adrian Mannarino is top seed at the ATP-250 tournament and has a bye in the opening round as well as second seed Richard Gasquet, third seed and title defender Gilles Muller and fourth seed Fernanco Verdasco.