Milos Raonic wins SAP Open After Beating Verdasco

Milos Raonic defeated Fernando Verdasco 7-6 7-6 to win the SAP Open, his first ATP Tour title.

Raonic came through in his first career final, becoming the youngest winner on tour since Marin Cilic won in New Haven in 2008 at age 19.

Raonic fought off four set points in the first-set tiebreaker and then took advantage of the only minibreak in the second-set tiebreaker to win the match. The ending was controversial as Verdasco hit a service return into the net as a fan yelled out.

Verdasco complained but to no avail despite his complaints to the chair umpire that he was distracted.

“What I hope is that there are not people like that in the stadium,” Verdasco said. “If they don’t know the rules in tennis they can go see soccer.”

“I can’t stop smiling,” he said. “I’m happy about it and I hope I can keep it going more than six weeks, for a full year schedule, and see where I am at the end of the year.”

In a scheduling quirk, he will have to do it against Verdasco, who gets a shot at a rematch in the first round in Memphis on Wednesday.

“I will just pray a lot that he will hit a lot of double faults and I won’t even have to play,” Verdasco said.

Verdasco lost just seven points in 12 service games, but it was the four dropped points on his serve in the two tiebreakers that was the difference.

“When it gets close, it comes down to who gets it that day and it comes down to a few points,” Raonic said “I sort of used up my luck today and got out of that first set. In the second set, I was a bit more confident by then and it came out the way I wanted to.”

Raonic was given a Sharks jersey, along with the winners check for $92,000.

“It’s nice to know a hockey arena isn’t new to me,” Raonic said. “I’ve been in a few of these. This feels like home.”


Source AP/Yahoo