Haas suffers season-ending swine flu blow

 

Originally published on: 26/02/10 11:48

Tommy Haas’ season has come to a premature end after he was diagnosed with swine flu.

The world No.17, who reached the semi-finals at Wimbledon this year, pulled out of last week’s Stockholm Open after falling ill, and was later diagnosed with the highly contagious H1N1 strain of the virus.

“I did a test because I suspected that I had swine flu. The test was positive,” Haas was quoted on the website of German newspaper Bild. “Of course, it was a shock for me.”

“When you are someone who is physically fit, you can get over this”

The 31-year-old German is hoping to recover quickly but is unlikely to feature again this season. He has already been forced to withdraw from this week’s Davidoff Swiss Open in Basel, featuring world No.1 Roger Federer’s return to action.

“When you are someone who is as physically fit as I am you can quite easily get over this flu,” he said.

Haas is also likely to miss the BNP Paribas Masters 1000 event in Paris next week.

In Basel, Federer made a winning return as he bids for a fourth straight title in his home city.

The Swiss beat Belgium’s Olivier Rochus 6-3 6-4 to set pu a meeting with world No.51 Andreas Seppi in the next round.

Radek Stepanek crushed Rainer Schuettler 6-2 6-0 to book his second round spot, but Ivo Karlovic fell to a 7-6(5) 6-4 defeat to lucky loser Florent Serra.

Novak Djokovic, the No.2 seed, faces Andreas Beck later today.

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