Baptism by fire for Syed Fazaluddin

Voinea understood Fazal’s ploy and settled down quickly. He broke him in the fifth game with a running forehand winner which Fazal could only watch. Voined served out the set at love in 29 minutes. Fazal applauded Voinea’s forehand crosscourt winner from a difficult angle in the eighth game.

Fazal, who has hardly played at this level, could not match the consistency of Voinea. Fazal was under pressure in the first game of the second set with neatly timed returns. Break point down, Fazal buried a drop shot into the net. Fazal could not make any impact on Voinea’s serve while his service games became longer with Voinea hitting deep returns.

Fazal saved two break points with crisp volleying in the fifth game but Voinea broke him in the seventh game, to close out the match after 61 minutes.PTI adds: The major upset of the day was caused when unseeded David Sanchez of Spain caused a major upset ousting last year finalist Markus Hantschk of Germany 6-3, 6-3. Eight seeded Jiri Vanek of Czechoslovakia became the first causality as he was shown the door by Edwin Kempes of The Netherlands 7-6 (7-5), 4-6, 6-3 in a marathon dual which lasted 106 minutes. In another first round match, Michal Tabara of Czech defeated Fernando Gonzalvez of Chile 6-3, 6-3.

Gonzalez, winner of the Orlando ATP Tour title last year, was too good with his ground strokes and booming serves. In fact, in the second set Gonzalez send down six aces but his urgency to finish the match quickly proved counter-productive. He yielded too many negative points and served many double faults.

After Tabara took the first set with a break in the seventh game at 6-4, Gonzalez was broken in the third but returned the compliment with a break in the sixth for a 3-3 score. In the seventh, Tabara had two break points and Gonzalez double-faulted to give away the game. Tabara won the eighth game at 40-0 and then wrapped up the match in style. Tabara, ranked 96 in the world, now plays Edwin Kempes. In the Kempes-Vanek match, the former was a picutre of confidence as he matched the better ranked Vanek in the first set. Games went on serve before the first set meandered to tie-break, which Kempes won at 7-5.

In the second set, Kempes broke Vanek in the second game at 0-40. Vanek mixed aggression with defence and waited for the opportune time to score points.He broke Kempes in the fifth and seventh games for the second set. The first game in the third set saw long rallies and Vanek broke Kempes after two deuces but Kempes broke back in the fourth game and then was on level terms with his perfect exhibition of serve and volley game. The eighth game proved to be vital for Kempes and he was in total command of the game, while Vanek lost his concentration in double faulting twice before surrendering the game.

In the Sanchez-Hantschk match, the latter was totally off colour. Sanchez broke Hantschk in the second and fourth games and the German was shattered. In the second set too, Sanchez broke Hantschk in the third game and then went on to lead 5-3, before winning the match with a break in the ninth game.