Tobias Kamke of Germany defeated South Africa’s Izak van der Merwe 6-3, 6-3 to advance to the second round of the SAP Open on Monday, while John McEnroe made a brief return to play an exhibition doubles match, teaming with young American Jack Sock to beat Gael Monfils and Steve Johnson 6-4, 6-4 in a lighthearted match.
McEnroe showed the deft skill at the net that made him one of the game’s best doubles players ever in a match that included three players young enough to be his children.
“If you know some of the tricks of the trade, I don’t care,” he said. “I’m covering half the court. This is beautiful for me. I’m not saying I could go out and win things, but I’d be comfortable going against anybody right now playing doubles.”
McEnroe hit crisp volleys all match long, bringing back memories of his touring days when he won seven Grand Slam singles titles and 10 major doubles titles from 1977 to 1992.
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AP, ROTTERDAM, NETHERLANDS
Paul-Henri Mathieu fought back from a set down on Monday to upset fourth seed Feliciano Lopez 4-6, 7-6 (7/5), 6-4 in the opening round of the ABN Amro World Tennis Tournament.
Sixth-seeded Alexandr Dolgopolov of Ukraine also went out in the first round, losing 6-7 (4/7), 6-4, 6-2 to Lukasz Kubot of Poland.
Mathieu, ranked No. 733 in the world after missing the whole of last year with a knee injury, looked sharp in beating Lopez in a match that lasted nearly three hours.
“I worked hard during my injury and I think I am fit,” he said. “This is a good comeback.”
Another Frenchman, fifth seed Richard Gasquet, overcame an injured Flavio Cipolla to win his first-round match 6-3, 1-6, 6-1.
After losing the first set, Cipolla easily took the second, but struggled in the decider with a left-thigh injury.
Jesse Huta Halung advanced to the second round at the expense of two-time Rotterdam finalist Ivan Ljubicic. The Dutchman won 7-6 (8/6), 6-3 against the 2005 and 2007 runner-up to secure his first ever win at the tournament.
He next meets the winner of Thiemo de Bakker’s match against seventh-seeded Viktor Troicki.
BRAZIL OPEN
AP, SAO PAULO, BRAZIL
Seventh-seeded Albert Montanes of Spain lost to Filippo Volandri of Italy in the first round of the Brazil Open on Monday.
Volandri needed 65 minutes to defeat the 51st-ranked Montanes in Sao Paulo, converting four of his seven break points to advance to the second round.
Earlier, wild-card Javier Marti of Spain defeated 2009 semi-finalist Frederico Gil of Portugal 6-2, 6-4, while Brazil’s Ricardo Mello beat Pere Riba of Spain 6-4, 6-2 in the late match.
Taiwanese world No. 1 women’s doubles star Hsieh Su-wei on Saturday overcame a first-set loss to win her opening match at the Madrid Open. Top seeds Hsieh and partner Elise Mertens of Belgium, with whom she last month won her fourth Indian Wells women’s doubles title, bounced back from a rocky first set to beat Asia Muhammad of the US and Aldila Sutjiadi of Indonesia 2-6, 6-4, 10-2. Hsieh and Mertens were next to face Heather Watson of the UK and Xu Yifan of China in the round of 16. Thirty-eight-year-old Hsieh last month reclaimed her world No. 1 spot after her Indian
EYES ON THE PRIZE: Armed with three solid men’s singles shuttlers and doubles Olympic champions, Taiwan aim to make their first Thomas Cup semi-final, Chou Tien-chen said Taiwanese badminton star Tai Tzu-ying yesterday quickly dispatched Malaysia’s Goh Jin Wei in straight sets, while her male counterpart Chou Tien-chen beat Germany’s Kai Schaefer, as Taiwan’s women’s and men’s teams won their Group B opening rounds of the TotalEnergies BWF Thomas and Uber Cup Finals in Chengdu, China. World No. 5 Tai beat Goh 21-19, 22-20 in a speedy 33 minutes, her fourth straight victory over the world No. 24 shuttler since they first faced each other in the quarter-finals of the 2018 Malaysia Open, where Tai went on to win the women’s singles title. Malaysia followed up Tai’s opening victory
Chen Yi-tung (陳奕通) secured a historic Olympic berth on Sunday by winning the senior men’s foil event at the 2024 Asia Oceania Zonal Olympic Fencing Qualifiers in United Arab Emirates. Chen defeated Samuel Elijah of Singapore 15-4 in the final in Dubai to secure the only wild card in the event, making him the first male Olympian fencer from Taiwan in 36 years and only the sixth Taiwanese fencer to ever qualify for the quadrennial event. The last appearance by a Taiwanese male fencer at the Olympics was in 1988, when Wang San-tsai (王三財) and Cheng Ming-hsiang (鄭明祥) competed in Seoul. The
Rafael Nadal on Tuesday lost in straight sets to 31st-ranked Jiri Lehecka in the fourth round at the Madrid Open, while Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei advanced to the semi-finals in the women’s doubles. Nadal said that he was feeling good about his progress following his latest injury layoff. Nadal called it a “positive week” in every way and said his body held up well. “I was able to play four matches, a couple of tough matches,” Nadal said. “So very positive, winning three matches, playing four matches at the high level of tennis. I enjoyed a lot playing at home. I leave here with