Taiwanese No. 1 Lu Yen-hsun completed the first part of a double shift at the Aegon Open in Nottingham, England, yesterday after his first-round match was held up by rain on Monday evening.
World No. 61 Lu was leading 6-4, 4-2 when the match was suspended on Monday, but he returned to the Nottingham Tennis Centre grass courts yesterday morning and sealed a 6-4, 6-4 victory over Belgium’s Ruben Bemelmans inside 10 minutes.
Lu saved four of five break-point chances and converted three of six to wrap up the match in 1 hour, 14 minutes on Court Three, winning 67 of the 121 points contested.
Lu was due to return to Court One later yesterday to play his second-round match against world No. 27 Andreas Seppi of Italy, who as the 15th seed received a bye in the first round of the final warm-up tournament ahead of Wimbledon, which starts on Monday next week.
Aljaz Bedene warmed up for his first Wimbledon since switching nationality to British by beating Diego Schwartzman in one of just five completed first-round matches on Monday.
Slovenia-born Bedene, who was granted British citizenship in March, won 6-1, 6-7(5/7), 6-2 against his Argentine opponent and was due to play eighth seed Adrian Mannarino of France in the second round yesterday.
Santiago Giraldo of Colombia won 6-1, 1-6, 6-1 against Andreas Haider-Maurer of Austria, while Simone Bolelli, Malek Jaziri and Dudi Sela were all straight-sets winners before rain washed out play.
The top seeds were due on court yesterday, with David Ferrer, Feliciano Lopez and Gilles Simon all starting their title challenges. Ferrer was set to play Marcos Baghdatis in the headline match.
TIGHT GAME: The Detroit Pistons, the NBA’s second-best team, barely outlasted the Washington Wizards, who fell to an NBA-worst 1-10 with their ninth consecutive loss Cade Cunningham’s triple double, Daniss Jenkins’ three-pointer at the buzzer and Javonte Green’s overtime dunk lifted Detroit past Washington 137-135 on Monday, stretching the Pistons’ win streak to seven games. In an unexpected thriller, the NBA’s second-best team barely outlasted a Wizards club that fell to an NBA-worst 1-10 with their ninth consecutive loss. “We knew how big this game was for us,” Jenkins said. “We wasn’t going to let nothing stop us from getting this W.” Cunningham made 14-of-45 shots and 16-of-18 free throws for a career-high 46 points, and added 12 rebounds, 11 assists, five steals and two
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