Rune edges Navone in Madrid thriller

Holger Rune edged out Argentinian Mariano Navone 5-7, 7-6 (2), 6-4 in a tense battle to advance to the third round of the Madrid Masters at the Caja Magica on Friday evening.

Rune, ranked No 12, will play Dutchman Tallon Griekspoor next.

It was very nearly a very short stay in Madrid for the Dane, who was behind by a set and a break when Navone served for the match leading by 7-5, 6-5. But Navone faltered by double-faulting twice to hand Rune a break point, then made an error to allow the Dane to level at 6-6.

Rune won the tiebreaker and stormed ahead in the third set, but things would get complicated again.

Navone saved a match point while serving and trailing 5-1, then saved another three match points (brilliantly) with the Dane serving for the match at 5-4. Eventually Rune stood form and closed out the dramatic victory for his second career win in Madrid.

20-year-old Rune has already reached the final at clay-court Masters 1000 events (Monte-Carlo and Rome) but has yet to pass the third round at Madrid.

Navone, ranked No 41, won against Australian Alexei Popyrin (7-5, 6-2) in the previous round of the Madrid tournament.

Madrid Masters 1000, other second-round results (Caja Magica, clay, EUR 7.877.020, most recent results first):

• Miomir Kecmanovic vs. Casper Ruud
• Roberto Bautista Agut vs. Karen Khachanov
• Cameron Norrie vs. Joao Fonseca
• Felix Auger-Aliassime vs. Adrian Mannarino
• Alex De Minaur vs. Rafael Nadal
• Tomas Machac vs. Ben Shelton
• Grigor Dimitrov vs. Jakub Mensik
• Nicolas Jarry vs. Flavio Cobolli
• Alexander Bublik vs. Roberto Carballes Baena
• Daniil Medvedev vs. Matteo Arnaldi
• Pedro Cachin vs. Frances Tiafoe
• Pavel Kotov vs. Jordan Thompson
• Jannik Sinner vs. Lorenzo Sonego
• Thiago Monteiro vs. Stefanos Tsitsipas
• Jiri Lehecka vs. Hamad Medjedovic
• Max Purcell vs. Sebastian Korda
• Alexander Zverev (4) beat Borna Coric: 6-3, 6-2
• Tallon Griekspoor vs. Taro Daniel: friday
• Jan-Lennard Struff (23) beat Jaume Munar: 6-1, 7-5
• Ugo Humbert (13) beat Botic van de Zandschulp: 6-3, 6-3
• Taylor Fritz (12) beat Luciano Darderi: 7-6 (1), 6-4
• Carlos Alcaraz (2) beat Alexander Shevchenko: 6-2, 6-1
• Hubert Hurkacz (8) beat Jack Draper: 6-1, 7-5
• Sebastian Baez (18) beat Luca Van Assche: 6-4, 6-7 (2), 6-3
• Denis Shapovalov beat Tomas Martin Etcheverry (26): 7-6 (3), 6-3
• Alejandro Davidovich Fokina (27) beat Juncheng Shang (WC): 7-5, 6-3
• Daniel Altmaier beat Arthur Fils (31): 6-2, 6-3
• Andrey Rublev (7) beat Facundo Bagnis (Q): 6-1, 6-4
• Thiago Seyboth Wild beat Lorenzo Musetti (28): 6-4, 6-4
• Francisco Cerundolo (21) beat Fabian Marozsan: 6-2, 7-6 (5)
• Tommy Paul (15) beat Lukas Klein (Q): 6-7 (5), 6-1, 6-4

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