British duo Dan Evans and Cameron Norrie were both eliminated from the China Open in the first round on Friday, following Andy Murray in suffering immediate exits from the ATP 500 event.
Despite coming back from a set down against a physically impaired Jannik Sinner, Evans still lost 4-6 7-6[2] 3-6 to the Italian sixth seed, before Norrie went down 4-6 6-1 6-4 to Andrey Rublev.
In their first-ever meeting at the top level, Evans landed just 43% of his first serves in the opening set with Sinner, who broke the British number two in the fifth game and comfortably served out the set.
An early break in the second saw Sinner build up a 5-3 lead, but a fired-up Evans fought back in astounding fashion, breaking to love to level the second set at 5-5 while the Italian was serving for the match.
Evans demonstrated incredible court coverage in the tie-breaker and forced a deciding set as Sinner overcooked a backhand, but an inch-perfect delicate shot at the net saw the 22-year-old draw first blood in the third.
Evans refused to throw in the towel and earned one break back from 40-0 down, after which Sinner received treatment on a leg problem, which would hamper him severely in the eighth game as he slipped and started limping.
© Reuters
Nevertheless, the world number seven managed to soldier on and remarkably broke Evans to give himself a second chance to serve out the match, which he did on a long backhand return from the Briton.
Following Evans's elimination, Norrie sought to repeat his straight-sets victory over Rublev from their Indian Wells contest earlier this year, but the Russian continued his pattern of winning one then losing one against the 28-year-old thanks to a stellar fightback.
Rublev almost let his emotions get the better of him when he lost his serve in the seventh game of the first set - slamming drinks bottles on the side of his chair and nearly smashing his racquet before thinking better of it.
Norrie did not face a single break point in the opening set, but he fell 2-0 down in the second on a mishit forehand and fired wide on the same side to gift Rublev the double break, despite beating away four previous opportunities for the Russian.
Norrie at least managed to avoid a bagel, but Rublev saved three break points of his own before levelling the match, and he earned the first break of the decider in fortunate circumstances - holding both hands up in apology after a shot clipped the net tape and just bounced over to Norrie's side.
Two match points came and went for Rublev on the Briton's serve, but the fifth seed brought up another two chances with a stunning forehand into the corner and got the job done in just over two hours, setting up a second-round meeting with Ugo Humbert in the process.
Ben Knapton
