Florian Mayer defied his ranking of 192 to win his first title in five years with a 6-2, 5-7, 6-3 defeat of fellow German Alexander Zverev at the Gerry Weber Open yesterday.
Mayer, ranked outside the top 200 for almost a year and a half due to an adductor injury, used a protected ranking of 34th to enter the grass event in Halle. The 32-year-old struck a blow for the older tennis generation with his win over one of the rising hopes of the ATP, adding teenager Zverev to a victim’s list this week which also included seventh-ranked Austrian Dominic Thiem, who won in Stuttgart.
Mayer also received a walkover when Kei Nishikori retired injured before their second round match. Mayer claimed the only other trophy of his career in 2011 in Bucharest on clay.
In Halle, he put away Zvereva after two hours on his fifth match point. “I’ve not been able to play all-out for two years due to various injuries,” Mayer said. “I was never sure if I could ever come back. But now I’m standing here and I cannot believe it. I was so nervous in the last game that I could barely hold the racquet.”
Zverev, still searching for his first title, saved a pair of match points in the tenth game of the second set and broke Mayer for 6-5 before levelling at a set each. But experience paid off for Mayer, who stormed back in the third to earn the welcome victory.
Mayer’s win was his seventh of the season after missing a five combined months of ATP play from the US Open through to his return last April in Munich. Mayer joins Tommy Haas (2009, 2012), Philipp Kohlschreiber (2011), David Prinosil (2000), Nicolas Kiefer (1999) and Michael Stich (1994) as German champions on the Halle grass.
Zverev has now gone down in two finals over the past month.   The youngster had knocked out Roger Federer in the semi-finals.