Stefanos Tsitsipas on Tuesday made a winning start to the Monte Carlo Masters after the world No. 5 cruised past Aslan Karatsev 6-3, 6-4 and into the last 16.
Greece’s Tsitsipas, who had been given a bye into the second round, took just 1 hour, 24 minutes to beat 29th-ranked Karatsev of Russia.
The 22-year-old exploited 32 unforced errors from Karatsev to set up a clash with either Australia’s John Millman or Chile’s Cristian Garin.
Photo: AFP
Meanwhile, Novak Djokovic next faces Jannik Sinner in his second-round match, after Italy’s up-and-coming star saw off Spain’s Albert Ramos-Vinolas in straight sets 6-3, 6-4.
Teenager Sinner has risen to 22nd in the world rankings after reaching the final of the Miami Open earlier this month.
“I will definitely have a game plan,” Sinner said, referring to his first meeting with Djokovic. “I know who is on the other side.”
Sinner, one of five Italians to reach the second round in Monte Carlo on Tuesday, is 15-5 so far this year, but is competing in the main draw of a Masters 1000 event for just the fourth time of his career.
Earlier on Tuesday, Daniil Medvedev pulled out of the tournament after testing positive for COVID-19. The world No. 2 tested positive on Monday, after having practiced with Rafael Nadal the day before.
Organizers declined to comment on whether third seed Nadal risked being identified as a “close contact” of Medvedev and forced to quarantine.
Nadal is seeded to meet Djokovic in the tournament final, as he chases a 12th triumph at Monte Carlo, an important clay-court tournament in the run-up to the French Open.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
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Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier