{"id":422163,"date":"2026-02-12T17:58:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T17:58:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/422163\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T17:58:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T17:58:11","slug":"veteran-stan-wawrinka-shrugs-off-age-gap-to-beat-teenager-thijs-boogaard-in-rotterdam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/422163\/","title":{"rendered":"Veteran Stan Wawrinka shrugs off age gap to beat teenager Thijs Boogaard in Rotterdam"},"content":{"rendered":"

Swiss veteran Stan Wawrinka added another highlight to his \u2060farewell season by overcoming a 23-year age gap in a 6-3 6-4 victory over \u200c17-year-old Thijs Boogaard in the first round of the \u200cRotterdam Open on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The 40-year-old’s match<\/a> \u200cagainst Dutch lucky loser Boogaard<\/a> featured the second-largest \u200cage gap in ATP Tour and Grand \u200cSlam history. Dominic Thiem<\/a> was 18 when he beat 44-year-old Thomas Muster<\/a> in Vienna in 2011.<\/p>\n

“I’m \u200chappy with the way I was \u2060playing,” Wawrinka<\/a> said.<\/p>\n

“He’s \u200ca really young player. He has many years \u200bon tour for sure. But I was really happy with the level today. \u200bI was focused on myself, trying to be aggressive.<\/p>\n

“The conditions are quite slow, so \u2060it’s never easy \u200breally to dictate. But I’m happy with my level so far.”<\/p>\n

\"MatchMatch statsEnetpulse<\/p>\n

Three-times Grand Slam champion Wawrinka, who said last year that 2026 would \u200cbe his final season, takes on Australian world number eight Alex de Minaur<\/a> next.<\/p>\n

“He’s a tough player,” Wawrinka said.<\/p>\n

“Especially in these conditions, it’s going to be difficult to generate something. But I’m looking forward to the challenge. I’ve been playing some good matches against top players, so I’m always trying to \u200cpush myself.”<\/p>\n

Wawrinka made his Grand Slam breakthrough \u200bby winning the 2014 Australian Open and \u200clast month became the oldest man to reach the third round of the Melbourne major since Ken Rosewall<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He is expected to play in the other Grand Slams \u2060this year before \u2060wrapping up his \u200ccareer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Swiss veteran Stan Wawrinka added another highlight to his \u2060farewell season by overcoming a 23-year age gap in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":422164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-422163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422163","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=422163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/422163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/422164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=422163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=422163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=422163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}