Team Canada faces an early deficit in their 2025 Davis Cup Qualifiers 1st Round tie after Fabian Marozsan scored the opening point for Hungary on Saturday, beating Canada’s Alexis Galarneau in three sets.
Gabriel Diallo will look to level the tie for the hosts when he takes on Marton Fucsovics in the second match of the day.
Marozsan got off to a quick start in the opening match and, despite Galarneau picking up his level as the match went along, was the more consistent of the two, giving his nation the early lead with a 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 win.
With just one break per set, the margins were razor-thin between the pair. Marozsan converted two of his six break point chances while limiting Galarneau to just two looks, of which Canadian converted one.
Galarneau came out a bit tentative to start the match while Marozsan seemed to be in full flow right from the first ball. In the Canadian’s opening service game, a forehand long put him down love-40 and another one cost him the early break.
After falling behind, Galarneau started to up his aggression. He found success when he was able to step in and be the attacker in the rallies, particularly with his backhand down the line. However, he was only able to do so on his own serve. Marozsan never gave the Canadian a chance to get into one of his service games, riding that early broke through the opening set.
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Early in the second, a successful challenge from Galarneau flipped the momentum. On Marozsan’s serve at 1-2, the Hungarian fired a shot close to the line that was called in to give him a 30-15 lead, but Galarneau’s challenge showed the ball was out, instead handing the advantage to the Canadian. On the next point, Marozsan netted a backhand to go down double break point and dumped another backhand into the net to hand a 3-1 lead to Galarneau.
Twice in the following game as the Lavallois tried to consolidate, a big return from Marozsan set up a break point but both times Galarneau fired an ace. He hit another ace to close out the game for a 4-1 lead. That was as close as the Hungarian would get as Galarneau hung on to his serve, ultimately sending the set to a decider with another ace.
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The third set got off to the same start as the third, with Galarneau playing a tight service game to be broken as Marozsan raced out to a 3-0 lead. Like the first set, the Canadian picked up his level as the set went along but was unable to claw the break back.
His best chance came at 4-2 when he teed off on a couple of returns to take a love-30 lead, but Marozsan reeled off four straight points to hold. Galarneau kept the match alive by saving a match point with an ace on his own serve but when it came time to serve out the match, the Hungarian finished it off with a big serve of his own.
Diallo and Fucsovics will contest the second and final match of the day. The best-of-five tie will be decided on Sunday.
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