Alex de Minaur enjoys a late birthday gift and his 200 ° Victoria on the hard field on the ATP tour while triumphing in Qatar

Alex de Minaur has enjoyed a late birthday gift by fighting the last 16 of the Qatar Open with a victory of straight sets over the stubborn Roman Roman Safiullin.

Australia's number 1 had spent his birthday on Monday on the practice courts at the Khalifa International Tennis Complex in Doha, and emerged in a good mood the next day, since he used a late resistance of the old fourth finalist of Wimbledon Safiullin to succeed 6 -1 7-5.

In difficult and advantageous conditions on Tuesday, it was the ideal beginning for De Minaur, whom he received a quite friendly early draw in his last search to win an ATP 500 tournament after being beaten in the final in Rotterdam nine days before.

The Minaur record in the 500 high -level events has been exceptional since the beginning of 2023. In fact, no player has won more of his 34 games in the last three years, which had two title wins in Acapulco.

But the ATP calendar this year has led De Minaur to take the 'obvious' option to look triumphs in Mexico.

Until now, it is very good for the Australian, since he enjoyed his 12th victory of the tour of the year on Tuesday, after having lost only two, at the Australian Open to Jannik Sinner and in Rotterdam Carlos Alcaraz.

Alex de Minaur claimed his 200th victory on the hard court on the ATP tour on Tuesday, one day after celebrating his 26th birthday

In difficult and advantageous conditions on Tuesday, he beat Russian Roman Safiullin 6-1 7-5.

British tennis star, Katie Boulter

But it turned out to be a little harder than I expected in cold, wet and suction cups while facing Safiullin, who has had a start without victories in the year.

“Oh man, they are difficult days, these,” Minaur smiled, after his victory in an hour 37 minutes over the world no 71.

'It's cold, it really doesn't want to get out of bed, but once you go out to the court, you have to do what you have to do to win, be it ugly tennis or beautiful tennis.

'It was rotating wind, it was not constant, so it made it quite difficult to play and feel comfortable out there. So any type of tactic that you had for the game came out and it was about surviving more than anything.

“At the end of the day, you just have to find a way to get the ball on the court and that is what I did today.”

However, part of De Minaur's tennis was “beautiful”, despite the conditions and it was mostly Safiullin who served “ugly” things with 44 errors, which were classified as “not forced” despite the constant pressure that the Australian was exercising on his low confidence opponent.

From Minaur, who registered his 200 200-court victory on hard courts, won five games in the rebound to sweep the first set in 36 minutes and everything looked like a simple navigation when he broke 3-2 in the second and served for the game to the match 5-4.

But Safiullin then went bankrupt, leveling 5-5 only so that No. 6 of the world increases his game once again and immediately returned before serving for a victory that establishes a date of the last 16 with the Dutch Botic van From Zandschulp, Victor about Abedallah Shelbayh by Jordan 7-5 6-3.