Despite celebrating his highest ATP ranking to date, our Kevin Anderson has gone down in the second round of the Monte Carlo Masters on Wednesday, writes Mark Etheridge.
Anderson, top-ranked SA player at 26, went down to the ninth seeded Marin Cilic.
The Croatian beat him 6-2 6-3 in the 2.6 million Euros competition.
Surprisingly, the big-serving Anderson could only find two aces compared to the four of Cilic. His first service percentage was a steady 70% but he only won 62% of first-service points compared to an excellent 91% by Cilic.
In the first round, Anderson had a good win against Poland’s 24th ranked Jerzy Janowicz, going through in straight sets┬á 7-5 7-6.
Anderson went into the tournament on the back of reaching the final of the  Grand Prix Hassan II tournament in Morocco on Sunday.