\u201cI checked with his agent [on Friday night] and there was no change. But I got a phone call from Stan on [Saturday] morning, who told me his decision.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lamperin was naturally disappointed but philosophical.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not a blow in terms of the quality of the draw, but it\u2019s just a shame because it was his final season and I wanted to give a chance for people to see him one more time and say goodbye after such a great career and we won\u2019t have that opportunity,\u201d said Lamperin.<\/p>\n
On the upside, his exit has allowed 2024 champion Alejandro Tabilo a ticket to the main draw. The Chilean world No 81 was set to play qualifying this morning, before getting the direct entry offer, which he accepted.<\/p>\n
Two-time champion Roberto Bautista Agut has also bolstered the field. The Spaniard, who lifted the trophy here in 2016 and 2018, has got a wildcard, after Gael Monfils was promoted to the main draw, following the withdrawal of other players who have gone deep in other tournaments this week.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I messaged him on Friday night he called me straight away and he was over the moon,\u201d said Lamperin.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe said \u2018Auckland means a lot to me and I\u2019m delighted to play\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 37-year-old will feature in one of the best first-round men\u2019s matches, up against big-serving Frenchman Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard. The 2.03m Perricard reached world No 29 last February and is tipped as one to watch this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s obviously still a raw talent,\u201d said Lamperin. \u201cHe still needs to work on a number of aspects in this game. But once he puts everything together, he can do some massive damage on the tour.\u201d<\/p>\n
Defending champion Monfils (world No 69) faces Hungarian Fabian Marozsan (53) in a rematch of their 2024 opener here, when the latter prevailed in three sets. <\/p>\n
Auckland-raised Cam Norrie (No 28) has drawn a qualifier, as he seeks an elusive first title here, while Kiwi wildcard James Watt faces American Jenson Brooksby (No 49) in his centre-court debut.<\/p>\n
\u201cFabian is very talented,\u201d said Lamperin. \u201cHe can score winners from anywhere on the court. I feel like Gael is ready, he\u2019s prepared really hard in the offseason, so it\u2019s a match that I\u2019m looking forward to watching.\u201d<\/p>\n
The top four seeds \u2013 American Ben Shelton, Norway\u2019s Casper Ruud, Czech Jakub Mensik and Luciano Darderi (Italy) \u2013 all have a bye to the second round and will be in action on Wednesday. <\/p>\n
In Saturday\u2019s qualifying action, both Kiwi wildcards exited at the first hurdle. Isaac Beecroft was competitive for periods against Frenchman Hugo Gaston but couldn\u2019t maintain the required level for long enough, going down 6-3 6-2 in 1h 13m. Anton Shepp, who was coming off his win in the recent Hamilton ITF tournament, impressed in the first set against German Jan-Lennard Struff, who has been as high as No 33 in the world. <\/p>\n
He recovered a 0-3 deficit to get back on serve and the match was in the balance at 30-30, 5-6, before a couple of errors gave Struff the set. Shepp had good moments in the second bracket but Struff eventually prevailed 7-5 6-2.<\/p>\n
Michael Burgess<\/a> has been a Sports Journalist for the New Zealand Herald since 2005, covering the Olympics, Fifa World Cups, and America\u2019s Cup campaigns. He is a co-host of the Big League podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI checked with his agent [on Friday night] and there was no change. But I got a phone…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":363492,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[139111,39663,81698,1308,40114,139110,37988,25272,67190,13676,139114,56215,29941,22581,139113,25002,139112,4995,1773,9360,133711,91618,101,139109,118,6904,90335,56,54,55,97048,115720],"class_list":["post-363491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-agut","tag-around","tag-asb","tag-atp","tag-auckland","tag-bautista","tag-boss","tag-call","tag-classic","tag-event","tag-expecting","tag-gets","tag-half","tag-hoping","tag-lamperin","tag-morning","tag-nicolas","tag-of","tag-out","tag-phone","tag-receive","tag-roberto","tag-sports","tag-stan","tag-tennis","tag-this","tag-tournament","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wawrinka","tag-wildcard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363491","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=363491"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363491\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/363492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=363491"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=363491"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=363491"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}