June 22, 2007	Friday	Jamadi-us-Sani 06, 1428

LAHORE, June 21: Pakistan's top tennis star Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi on Thursday created history by becoming the only Pakistani to enter Wimbledon through the qualifying rounds.

Aisam hit the limelight after winning third and final qualifying round against Canadian No 1 Frank Dancevic in a four-set thriller, lasting two hours and 50 minutes, 4-6, 7-6 (11-9), 6-2, 7-6 (7-4).

Dancevic, among world’s top 100, has been playing Wimbledon main draw regularly. Frank was the fourth seed at the Wimbledon qualifying draw and a favourite today but Pakistani star had other plans and pulled off a great upset.

Right in the beginning of the first set, Frank broke Aisam's serve and continued to maintain his upper hand to eventually take the set comfortably.

Aisam, unfazed by the set loss, ceme back hard at Frank and got two break points on his opponent’s first service game. The set went into tie break and both players were tied at 6-6. In the tie break again it was real tooth and nail competition and at 8-8 Frank was able to break Aisam's serve to take a 9-8 lead which provided him a set point.But Aisam struck back like lightening and snatched next two points from Frank to take a 10-9 lead. He made no further mistake to take the tie break with an 11-9 score.

Having equalled the match with one-set all, a charged-up Aisam then broke Frank's serve twice to take a 4-0 lead and went on to win the third set to shock his rival.

In the fourth set, Frank appeared to have an edge over his Asian rival but Aisam had regained his form and the set went on to 6-6 at one stage. But Aisam proved too good as he went on to take 4-0 lead and eventually took the set 7-6 in the tie break. —APP