Top seeds advance at Indian Wells

Top-ranked Rafael Nadal and Caroline Wozniacki ease through their Indian Wells openers.

INDIAN WELLS:

Top-ranked Rafael Nadal and Caroline Wozniacki eased through their Indian Wells openers, but Australian Open runner-up Andy Murray bit the dust in the Californian desert.

Nadal defeated South African Rik de Voest 6-0, 6-2 at the Indian Wells WTA and ATP Masters 1000 event.

Nadal, who helped Spain win their Davis Cup first-round tie against Belgium last week, now has two career wins over de Voest but it has been eight years between their matches.

The Spaniard won their only previous meeting in 2003 at a Challenger event in France when he was just 16.

“I’m a better player now. The worst thing is that I’m eight years older,” said the top-seed Nadal, who had a bye in the first round.

He will next tackle Ryan Sweeting who earlier defeated Argentine 27th-seed Juan Monaco 6-1, 0-6, 6-1.

Wozniacki eases through

Meanwhile, Wozniacki rolled over American wildcard Sloane Stephens 6-3, 6-2. The top-seed had little trouble, dispatching Stephens with a steady serve and precision forehand to win in just 68 minutes, wrapping up victory with a running forehand volley.

“It’s always nice to have a win and the first match is difficult,” said Wozniacki. “But I pulled through, so it’s nice.”

Murray makes early exit

Meanwhile, fifth-seeded Andy Murray and sixth-seed David Ferrer were joined on the sidelines by defending champion Ivan Ljubicic as all three lost their opening matches.

American qualifier Donald Young shocked Murray 7-6, 6-3 with the Scotsman looking rusty in his first career meeting against the 21-year-old opponent.

“I started the match well but then when it got close I didn’t do anything to lift myself,” said Murray.

“The crowd was for him and then he started to play better and I didn’t play my way back into the match.”

Meanwhile, Ferrer was also sent crashing, falling in the second round to unseeded Ivo Karlovic 7-6, 6-3 while Argentina’s Juan Martin del Potro, the former US Open champion, continued his impressive comeback from a wrist injury by rallying to beat defending champion Ivan Ljubicic 5-7, 6-4, 6-2.

In today’s matches, world number two Roger Federer will play his opener against Russia’s Igor Andreev, while Australian Open champion Novak Djokovic, Canadian wildcard Milos Raonic and women’s second-seed Kim Clijsters will also be in
action.

Indo-Pak Express rolls on

Meanwhile, in the doubles event, Pakistan tennis ace Aisamul Haq Qureshi and his Indian partner Rohan Bopanna defeated American Eric Butorac and Jean-Julien Rojer of the Netherlands Antilles 7-6, 6-4 in their opening match to go through to the second round.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, March 14^th, 2011.