Day 2 Round-Up: Federer cruises, Gasquet crashes
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Defending champion Roger Federer opened his Flushing Meadows account with a convincing first round victory on Tuesday.
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The world No.2 crushed Argentine Maximo Gonzalez 6-3, 6-0, 6-3 in his opening match in New York.
The Swiss 12-time grand slam winner should have another easy task ahead of him in round two when he faces Brazilian qualifier Thiago Alves.
“I am very happy to be back healthy, playing well and winning the first round is always great fun,” Federer said. “I am looking forward to more like that.”
The big shock of day two was the departure of unpredictable Frenchman Richard Gasquet, the 12th seed going down in five sets to Germany’s Tommy Haas 6-7, 6-4, 5-7, 7-5, 6-2.
Twenty-second seed Tomas Berdych also crashed out, losing easily 6-3, 6-1, 6-2 to American Sam Querrey.
They were the only two men’s seeds to go out, though, as Tommy Robredo, Ivo Karlovic, Igor Andreev, Paul-Henri Mathieu, Fernando Gonzalez, Andreas Seppi and Fernando Verdasco all won.
In the women’s event, top seed Ana Ivanovic’s recent poor form continued but she managed to survive a scare against Russian Vera Dushevina before winning 6-1, 4-6, 6-4.
“I dropped my concentration,” said Ivanovic, who has been suffering with a thumb injury lately.
From 2-3 in the decider, the world No.1 finally got her game together, though, and goes on to face Julie Coin from France in round two.
Eleventh seed Daniela Hantuchova was the biggest casualty in the women’s draw on day two.
The Slovak stunner and 11th seed went out 6-4, 6-2 to Anna-Lena Groenefeld from Germany.
Elsewhere, there were wins for fourth seed Serena Williams, who hammered Ukraine’s Kateryna Bondarenko 6-1, 6-4 and seventh seeded Venus, who powered past Aussie Sam Stosur 6-2, 6-3.
The sisters are scheduled for a quarter-final showdown if they both keep progressing.
In-form Russian Dinara Safina also made it into the second round without much fuss courtesy of a 6-3, 6-4 result against Kristie Ahn from the US.
Fellow seeds Nadia Petrova, Agnes Szavay, Dominika Cibulkoa, Flavia Pennetta, Alona Bondarenko, Nicole Vaidisova, Agnieszka Radwanska, Alize Cornet and Ai Sugiyama all went through.
