Brazilian world No.40 Thomaz Bellucci has moved into the second round of the BNP Paribas Masters after defeating Russian lucky loser Teymuraz Gabashvili 6-4, 6-4.
Bellucci endured a tough two sets encounter against the Russian with a series of breaks for both players throughout the match. After opening up a 2-0 lead at the start of the match, Gabashvili broke back to level the opening set at 3-3. Despite the Russian comeback, Bellucci responded automatically by breaking for the second time of the match to clinch the first set.
Bellucci faced another struggle going into the second set as he trailed 0-2 before breaking the Russian’s serve two consecutive times as he claimed four consecutive games to have a stronghold on the match. The Brazilian finally close out the match with his third match point after an hour and forty-seven minutes.
In the second round Bellucci will face a tough task against world No.1 Novak Djokovic, who is currently on a 17-match winning streak. It will be the third meeting this year between the two players. In their two previous matches Djokovic has taken the victory but was pushed to three sets by Bellucci in Rome.
Bernard Tomic spent less than an hour on the court as he cruised past Italy’s Fabio Fognini 6-3, 6-2. The straightforward match was surprising considering that the two men are only separated by four ranking places (Tomic is currently ranked 18th and Fognini is 22nd). The match was an error-stricken performance from the Italian who produced 38 unforced errors compared to Tomic’s 14. The Australian fired 6 aces and 17 winners past Fognini to beat the Italian for the first time in his career.
Andreas Seppi kept Italian hopes alive after battling past Pablo Cuevas 7-5, 6-3. The last Italian in the draw fended off two break points and converted 3/10 of his own. The 31-year-old produced 23 winners and 25 unforced errors to grab his third win in the main draw of a Masters tournament this year. The reward for Seppi will be a second round encounter against Roger Federer. After suffering 12 consecutive losses to the Swiss player, Seppi produced one of the biggest upsets in his career by stunning the 17-time Grand Slam champion in the third round of this year’s Australian Open. Seppi will be hoping to produce another shock as he bids to win back-to-back matches in a Masters tournament for the first time since the 2014 Monte Carlo Masters.
Elsewhere on the first day of of the tournament, Austria’s Dominic Thiem survived a second set scare before defeating home favourite Adrian Mannarino 6-2, 5-7, 6-2.
