LOS ANGELES — Turned out to be not such an impressive comeback for Ernests Gulbis after all.

After managing to put away Lukas Lacko 7-5, 7-5 in the first round of the Farmers Classic on Tuesday, Gulbis just didn’t have the stamina to defeat Colombian Alejandro Falla in a long, hard-fought match on Thursday.

Gulbis won the first set 6-4, but lost the next two 6-3, 7-6. The third set proved his undoing, as he won the first three games but then lost three in a row. However, after getting up 6-4 Falla still couldn’t put Gulbis away until 13 games had been played.

Although Falla barely got by, Gulbis was hardly calling it a moral victory giving reporters several self-effacing comments in the post-match press conference.

“I just played … women’s tennis,” Gulbis told reporters. “If you don’t fish for two months, maybe you’re bad at fishing. I was so tired. It was really tough for me to go for long rallies.”

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