Argentine Guillermo Canas, still rebuilding after a left wrist injury, opened his Barcelona Open campaign on Monday with a 6-1, 6-4 first-round win over unseeded Spaniard Oscar Hernandez.
Ninth seed Canas, the runner-up to Rafael Nadal last year, cruised through the first set and kept his concentration in the second to see off Hernandez, ranked 72.
Having missed the Australian Open because of injury, Canas returned to the tour in Acapulco in late February and reached the semi-finals of the ATP event in Las Vegas.
PHOTO: AFP
The 30-year-old, now ranked 31, will play either Russian Teimuraz Gabashvili or his compatriot Guillermo Coria, the former French Open runner-up who was granted a wildcard.
Croatian Mario Ancic, himself in the early stages of a comeback from illness and injury, crushed German Mischa Zverev 6-1, 6-0 to set up a second-round meeting with seventh seed Andy Murray of Britain.
Ancic, who was ranked in the top 10 in 2006, missed six months of last year because of glandular fever, but has climbed to the verge of the world’s top 50 thanks to a run of form that included a final appearance in Marseille in February, where he lost to Murray.
“I think he was struggling a little bit on the clay,” Ancic said of Zverev.
“I was happy that I played solid from the first to the last point. It’s never easy when you win the first set so easy but I played well, served well and didn’t let anything slip through my hands. I’m still looking for my game a little bit but hopefully it [the Murray match] is going to be a good battle,” he said.
Spanish 13th seed Fernando Verdasco was a first-round casualty, going down 6-3, 6-4 to Nicolas Lapentti of Ecuador.
Another Argentine, Juan Ignacio Chela, a late replacement for former French Open champion Juan Carlos Ferrero, who pulled out on the eve of the event with a groin injury, rallied past Spaniard Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 6-7 6-4 6-2.
Russian Dmitry Tursunov, seeded 15, won his first match on clay since last year’s French Open when he ousted big-serving South African Kevin Anderson 6-4, 6-3, while Dutchman Robin Haase beat Max Mirnyi of Belarus 6-2, 6-2 and now plays sixth seed Tommy Robredo.
Top seed Nadal begins his bid for a fourth successive Barcelona title today against the winner of the first-round match between Italian Potito Starace and Australian Peter Luczak.
Meanwhile, king of the clay court artists Nadal will be feeling good about his game as he headlines the Barcelona Open following an historic fourth straight Monte Carlo title taken at the expense of Roger Federer.
“I lost easy in Australia [semi-finals], Indian Wells [semi-finals] and Miami [final against Nikolay Davydenko],” said Nadal, who has won 98 of his last 99 matches on clay.
“But when you are playing well, you feel you can win a tournament. Playing a bad match in the last round leaves you with a bad feeling going into the next event,” he said.
Nadal, who beat rival Roger Federer for the third consecutive year in the Monte Carlo title match — won’t be having that problem as he awaits a second round opponent from Italian Potito Starace and Pete Luczak.
The Warsaw-born Luczak may be an Aussie, but that doesn’t preclude him from having a handy game on the dirt, having won four of his last five this month on the surface.
Nadal will be in demand on and off the court this week in the Catalan capital, with a Monday sponsor appearance already ticked off the list of his mandatory sponsor activities.
As in Monaco, the world No. 2 is aiming for more record-setting, hoping to lift his fourth straight at the Real club.
Number 15 Russian Dmitry Tursunov became the first seed to advance, defeating South African Kevin Anderson 6-4, 6-3 while Ecuador’s Nicolas Lapentti scored an upset as he beat Fernando Verdasco, 13th, with a 6-3, 6-4 scoreline.
British wildcard Andy Murray’s second-round opponent will be a rejuvenated Mario Ancic, who crushed Russian Mihail Zverev 6-1, 6-0. Ancic leads Murray 2-1 in their meetings, taking the last victory in march in the Miami second round.
“We’ve had some tough matches,” said the Croatian, who recovered last year from glandular fever which kept him out of action for six months.
Murray won in February when he faced Ancic in the Marseille final. As usual, the Barcelona field is packed with locals, with 10 Spaniards playing first-round matches.
Unknown number 237 Gabriel Trujillo-Soler booked the first Iberian victory, reaching the second round over hard-luck Austrian Werner Eschauer 6-4, 4-6, 6-2.
Eschauer has not won an ATP-level match since Jan. 1, suffering eight losses at the senior level.
Shohei Ohtani and Clayton Kershaw on Friday joined their Los Angeles Dodgers teammates in sticking their fists out to show off their glittering World Series rings at a ceremony. “There’s just a lot of excitement, probably more than I can ever recall with the Dodger fan base and our players,” manager Dave Roberts said before Los Angeles rallied to beat the Detroit Tigers 8-5 in 10 innings. “What a way to cap off the first two days of celebrations,” Roberts said afterward. “By far the best opening week I’ve ever experienced. I just couldn’t have scripted it any better.” A choir in the
The famously raucous Hong Kong Sevens are to start today in a big test for a shiny new stadium at the heart of a major US$3.85 billion sports park in the territory. Officials are keeping their fingers crossed that the premier event in Hong Kong’s sporting and social calendar goes off without a hitch at the 50,000-seat Kai Tak Stadium. They hope to entice major European soccer teams to visit in the next few months, with reports in December last year saying that Liverpool were in talks about a pre-season tour. Coldplay are to perform there next month, all part of Hong Kong’s
Shohei Ohtani, Teoscar Hernandez and Tommy Edman on Thursday smashed home runs to give the reigning World Series champions the Los Angeles Dodgers a 5-4 victory over Detroit on the MLB’s opening day in the US. The Dodgers, who won two season-opening games in Tokyo last week, raised their championship banner on a day when 28 clubs launched the season in the US. Dodgers manager Dave Roberts shuffled his batting lineup with all four leadoff hitters finally healthy as Ohtani was followed by Mookie Betts, then Hernandez and Freddie Freeman in the cleanup spot, switching places with Hernandez. “There’s a Teoscar tax to
Matvei Michkov did not score on Monday, but the Philadelphia rookie had a hand in both goals as hosts the Flyers earned a 2-1 victory over the Nashville Predators. Ryan Poehling and Jamie Drysdale got the goals for the Flyers (31-36-9, 71 points), who won their third straight. Michkov and Travis Konecny assisted on both. Ivan Fedotov stopped 28 shots to earn his first win since March 1, ending a personal six-game losing streak. Zachary L’Heureux got the lone goal for Nashville. Michael McCarron and Brady Skjei got the assists for the Predators (27-39-8, 62 points), who have just four goals in their
RSS