Taipei, Jan. 8 (CNA) Tennis great Andre Agassi of the United States and Marat Safin of Russia concluded a highly-publicized exhibition series in Taiwan Saturday with Agassi beating his relatively youthful opponent again in their second and final match in the southern port city of Kaohsiung.
Agassi, 40, beat 30-year-old Safin 3-6, 6-3, 10-8 again in a super tiebreaker after his first win 2-6, 7-6 (9-7), 13-11 in Taipei Thursday, capping off the American's five-day stay in Taiwan, a country which he last visited 22 years ago.
The exhibition events, titled the "Rise of Legends, " feature Agassi, Safin, Youzhny and local players Lu Yen-hsun and Jimmy Wang. The first matches were played in Taipei Thursday.
The eight-time Grand Slam winner told screaming crowds at Kaohsiung Arena in his post-match remarks that he will consider visiting Taiwan again and bring his world-famous wife Steffi Graf, who won 22 women's Grand Slam singles titles, next time.
Not to be outdone by Agassi both on and off the court, two-time Grand Slam titlist Safin, who retired in 2009 at an early age of 29, jokingly said he would talk to popular Russian female tennis players, including Maria Sharapova, Anna Kournikova and his sister Dinara Safina into visiting Taiwan with him the next time.
During the match, Agassi racked up seven straight points in the third set, which adopts the super tiebreaker, to turn a 4-1 deficit into a commanding 8-4 lead before earning his first match point at 9-6 with his eighth ace in the match.
Before the Agassi-Safin showdown -- the highlight of the night, world No. 10 Mikhail Youzhny of Russia defeated Taiwan's Lu Yen-hsun 7-6 (7-3) in a one-set exhibition match.
Youzhny revenged a 7-6 (7-5) loss Thursday to world No. 35 Lu, who fought off a match point to force a tie at 5-5 and survived another scare in the 12th game to take the match into a tiebreaker.
In the third match, also a one-setter, Agassi paired with Wang against the duo of Safin and Lu to round up the evening.
The Grand Slam winners held a clinic in the morning for local children before the evening match. They arrived in Kaohsiung Friday and participated in a charity auction event.
Around 7,000 and 9,500 tickets, ranging between NT$800 (US$27.4) and NT$10,000 (US$342) each, were sold in Kaohsiung and Taipei respectively, according to the game organizer Integration Sports, which also said that the exhibitions were not profitable. (By Chris Wang) enditem/jc