Stan Wawrinka bids farewell to the Olympics. The Vaud native loses his second round match against Australian Alexei Popyrin 4:6, 5:7.
The match lasted 90 minutes in sweltering heat. Stan Wawrinka failed to win his very first service game in the first set despite two game points. In the second set, Alexei Popyrin managed the decisive break at 6:5. Wawrinka never had a chance to break.
So Stan Wawrinka is once again bowing out of the Olympic tennis tournament early. The Olympic Games brought "Stan the Man" a huge highlight in 2008 in Beijing when he won the gold medal in the doubles with Roger Federer. In singles, however, Wawrinka never went to plan under the sign of the five rings: in 2008 in Beijing, he lost in the second round to Jürgen Melzer from Austria 4:6, 0:6. Four years later in London, Wawrinka lost in the starting round to Andy Murray. In Rio and Tokyo, Wawrinka was absent for various reasons. And this time, in the Stade Roland-Garros, he was outplayed by Al Popyrin, number 69 in the world rankings.
Stan Wawrinka's performance at the Olympic tournament was similar to that at many tournaments last year. Wawrinka has not won two singles matches at a tournament since the US Open 2023 at the end of August. His opponent Alexei Popyrin put in an extremely strong performance in front of a packed crowd that wanted to scream Wawrinka to victory. There was nothing to suggest that Popyrin had lost seven matches in a row on clay before the Olympic tournament.
SDA
