38-year-old captain of the Ukrainian women's tennis team, Ilya Marchenko (1390), secured a win in the first round of the ITF M25 tournament in Qiantao, China, against local player Zhang Minhui (2147).
The match lasted 3 hours and 33 minutes, concluding with a score of 7:6(5), 6:7(5), 6:4.
It is worth noting that both players successfully qualified for the tournament. This marks Marchenko's first competition since February of this year.
During the match, Marchenko recorded 6 aces, 10 double faults, and 3 breaks. His opponent had 6 aces, 4 service errors, and 2 breaks.
The two players had not faced each other before. In the next round, Marchenko will compete against the fourth seed, Uzbekistan's Sergey Fomin (462).