Grigor Dimitrov lost in the quarter-final stage of the last tournament of the year in the "Masters 1000" in Paris, reported Topsport.
The Bulgarian was defeated by the Russian Karen Khachanov with 2:6, 3:6 after an hour and ten minutes of play. Haskovlia was definitely not in his best condition and was definitely outplayed by his rival, who was in strong form.
Even at the beginning of the match, it was clear that Grigor Dimitrov was not in his best physical condition. The Bulgarian made a few unprovoked errors, giving Khachanov a chance to break through and take the first game of the match. The Russian kept his concentration and quickly took a 2:0 lead, and then made another break and the result was already 3:0 in the first set.
The Russian tennis player consolidated his second break by making a convincing service game to take a comfortable 4-0 lead that promised to win the first set.
Grigor Dimitrov finally managed to take his first game of the match, reducing his deficit to 1:4, but Karen Khachanov quickly took his serve and took a 5:1 lead.
In this period of the match, Grigor Dimitrov started playing stronger and managed to reduce his deficit to 2:5, but then Khachanov convincingly won his serve and took the first set 6:2.
The Bulgarian started the second set well and won the service game to take the lead for the first time since the start of the match. A game followed in which Dimitrov was even close to a breakthrough, but failed to do so and the score was 1:1.
Another game followed for Dimitrov and one for Khachanov for 2:2.
Grigor Dimitrov gave hints of positivity by winning the third game to take a 3:2 lead.
However, this was followed by a very strong performance by Karim Khachanov and a game at 0 for 3:3.
It was in the seventh game that the decisive moment of the set came, in which Khachanov made a breakthrough, led 4:3, and then consolidated it to take a 5:3 lead on the serve of Grigor Dimitrov.
Dimitrov started the game badly, in which he served to stay in the match, and the score quickly became 0:40. The Bulgarian managed to save two match points, but three-thirds made a double fault and the match ended.
So he was unable to defend his points from last year when he reached the final. Alexander Zverev - Holger Rune and Hugo Umber - Karen Khachanov will play in the penultimate phase of the tournament.