At 37 years of age, Ivo Karlovic is very much eager to make history. The Croatian surprised after winning the longest match in the Australian Open history over Horacio Zeballos 6-7 (6) 3-6 7-5 6-2 22-20. Ivo blasted 75, and he had to recover from a 0-2 set deficit. Ivo and Horacio played 450 points in this marathon.
I will never forget this. KARLOVIC
After the match, a visibly happy Karlovic commented
“This is up there definitely with all of them. It was a real difficult match.
If it was an easy match or I lost easy, I wouldn’t remember. But this one definitely I will remember forever. It was also difficult mentally because I was down 2-0. I had also to fight against him and against my own head, you know. So, it was definitely really difficult.
The atmosphere was really good. There was a lot of Croatians, a lot of Argentinians, also every other nationality. It was really cool.”
The match lasted 5 hours and 14 minutes and even if it had the longest 5th set in the Australian Open, it was still 6 hours shorter than the famous Isner-Mahut of Wimbledon 2010 that lasted more than 11 hours, and it was played over 3 days (6–4, 3–6, 6–7, 7–6, 70–68).
The moment ðŸ‡ðŸ‡· @ivokarlovic broke the #AusOpen record books. #7TENNIS #restday #welldeserved pic.twitter.com/xRvogWyup6
— #7TENNIS 🎾 (@7tennis) January 17, 2017
Next vs. Whittington
Ivo has now to recuperate to play the world no. 194 Andrew Whittington in the second round.
