Guillermo Garcia-Lopez of Spain rallied to beat Russian wild-card Evgeny Donskoy 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 on Monday in the first round of the St Petersburg Open.
The seventh-seeded Spaniard struggled with his serve early, dropping the first set and trailing 3-1 in the second, but his form picked up and he broke the 121st-ranked Donskoy twice to even the match at one set apiece.
Garcia Lopez broke decisively in the fourth game of the third set and finished the match by serving out to love.
In other first-round action, Italy’s Flavio Cipolla advanced with a 7-6 (7/4), 7-6 (8/6) win over qualifier Andrei Vasilevski of Belarus and Rajeev Ram of the US beat Matthias Bachinger of Germany 6-4, 6-4.
Ram broke Bachinger early in the first set, but fell 4-1 down in the second before winning five consecutive games.
Mikhail Youzhny, the 2004 champion and two-time runner-up, is the top-seeded player in the 18th edition of the tournament.
MOSELLE OPEN
AP, METZ, France
Veteran James Blake of the US beat French wild-card Albano Olivetti 6-2, 7-6 (7/4) on Monday, despite being aced 19 times in the first round of the Moselle Open.
Blake won 86 percent of his points on first serve and broke Olivetti three times.
He next faces fourth-seeded Florian Mayer of Germany, who he has defeated in all three of their matches.
The American lost his first six matches of the ATP World Tour season, but has improved to 8-12 overall.
The 20-year-old Olivetti, ranked 213th, was playing in only his fourth match on the ATP World Tour.
Shohei Ohtani and Clayton Kershaw on Friday joined their Los Angeles Dodgers teammates in sticking their fists out to show off their glittering World Series rings at a ceremony. “There’s just a lot of excitement, probably more than I can ever recall with the Dodger fan base and our players,” manager Dave Roberts said before Los Angeles rallied to beat the Detroit Tigers 8-5 in 10 innings. “What a way to cap off the first two days of celebrations,” Roberts said afterward. “By far the best opening week I’ve ever experienced. I just couldn’t have scripted it any better.” A choir in the
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Matvei Michkov did not score on Monday, but the Philadelphia rookie had a hand in both goals as hosts the Flyers earned a 2-1 victory over the Nashville Predators. Ryan Poehling and Jamie Drysdale got the goals for the Flyers (31-36-9, 71 points), who won their third straight. Michkov and Travis Konecny assisted on both. Ivan Fedotov stopped 28 shots to earn his first win since March 1, ending a personal six-game losing streak. Zachary L’Heureux got the lone goal for Nashville. Michael McCarron and Brady Skjei got the assists for the Predators (27-39-8, 62 points), who have just four goals in their
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