Stan Wawrinka bid farewell to the Monte Carlo Masters as the 2014 champion fell 7-5, 7-5 to Sebastian Baez in the first round on Monday.<\/p>\n
The 41-year-old three-time Grand Slam winner will retire from tennis at the end of the season and entered the main draw in Monaco as a wild card 20 years on from his debut at the tournament.<\/p>\n
The Swiss won his sole 1000-level title 12 years ago in the principality when he defeated his compatriot Roger Federer<\/a>.<\/p>\n “It was a long time ago, but of course I remember it, it was exceptional,” Wawrinka<\/a> said on court of his 2014 victory after tournament organisers showed a video homage to him.<\/p>\n “To have the chance to play this final here, with this exceptional tournament, and to win it in addition, will always be one of my best memories of my career.”<\/p>\n Heading into his round of 64 meeting with 65th-ranked Argentinian Baez<\/a>, Wawrinka’s only match since losing to eventual winner Daniil Medvedev<\/a> in the last 16 at February’s Dubai Open was a three-set defeat to then-world number 348 Matteo Martineau<\/a> at a challenger event on clay in Naples late last month.<\/p>\n Despite that, Wawrinka raced out of the blocks on Court Rainier III as he took a 4-1 lead in the opening set.<\/p>\n Baez hit back to level scores at 5-5 before pouncing on Wawrinka’s serve in the 11th game to get ahead.<\/p>\n Wawrinka then lost his opening service game of the second frame as Baez took control of the match, eventually closing out victory in one hour and 47 minutes<\/a> after weathering a stirring late comeback by the former world number three.<\/p>\n As reward for his win, Baez will next face world number one and reigning Monte Carlo champion Carlos Alcaraz<\/a> in the second round.<\/p>\n Elsewhere, three-time former winner Stefanos Tsitsipas<\/a> lost in straight sets<\/a> to 16th seed Francisco Cerundolo<\/a>.<\/p>\n Tsitsipas has not beaten a top-20 player on clay since August 2024.<\/p>\n Andrey Rublev<\/a> navigated his way through a topsy-turvy opener as the 13th seed beat Nuno Borges<\/a> 6-4, 1-6, 6-1<\/a> to set up a round of 32 meeting with Zizou Bergs<\/a>.<\/p>\n World number 47 Bergs booked his spot thanks to a 6-4, 6-3<\/a> victory against 37-year-old Adrian Mannarino<\/a>.<\/p>\n Arthur Rinderknech<\/a> eased past 12th seed Karen Khachanov<\/a> 7-5, 6-2<\/a> and will next play the winner of the meeting between Joao Fonseca<\/a> and Gabriel Diallo<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stan Wawrinka bid farewell to the Monte Carlo Masters as the 2014 champion fell 7-5, 7-5 to Sebastian…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":591418,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":{"0":"post-591417","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=591417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/591417\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/591418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=591417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=591417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=591417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}