I finally watched the second and third sets of the Tursunov match which I taped (I overslept and missed the first set, the match was stopped after the third set because of another sibling
).
He played too defensively, I think. He actually defended really really well but his passive play cost him in the end because he probably ran out of gas in the fifth.
Like Mag mentioned, there were a few bad line calls (Eric Molina
), one of them on SP in the third. The third set should have been concluded 7-5 instead of going to a TB. The consequence of that was that Tursunov served first in the fourth (an advantage) and Richard was unnecessary riled up by bad line calls in the TB. Both of these, IMO, gave Tursunov the edge in the fourth.
No excuses, though. Richard has to improve on his stamina and has to learn to block out things that go against him like bad line calls....