Hewitt wins battle of former No 1s

MONTREAL: Lleyton Hewitt won the battle of former world No 1s at the Montreal Masters by beating Spaniard Juan Carlos Ferrero 7-6 6-4 to reach the second round on Monday.

But there were shock defeats for 10th seed Tomas Berdych, No 11 Ivan Ljubicic and Argentine 15th seed Guillermo Canas.

Australian Hewitt, ranked four places below Ferrero at No 21, prevailed in one hour 47 minutes and will next play either American ninth seed James Blake or Juergen Melzer of Austria.

In his first tournament since Wimbledon, where he reached the fourth round, Hewitt's superior consistency helped him overcome Ferrero, who has shown signs recently of regaining his best form.

After trading an early break of serve, the rest of the first set went with service before Hewitt surged ahead 6-3 in the tiebreak and clinched it 7-5.

The Australian broke in the first game of the second set and, despite a couple of nervous moments, held the advantage to reach the second round.

"I probably took, maybe, not even a week off after Wimbledon and started hitting balls again, getting into it, in the gym every day," Hewitt told reporters.

"I was just trying to prepare as well as possible for the next few weeks. I enjoy this part of the year. I've always played well on US hard courts and at the US Open."

Niggling injuries

After winning the title in Las Vegas in March, Hewitt was hampered by niggling injuries for the next two months, but reached the semi-finals in Hamburg and round four at the French Open and Wimbledon.

"Indian Wells and Miami (in March) were frustrating because I was playing well going into those events," he said. "Winning Vegas, I felt like I was starting to turn it around again. "After Miami, I spent a lot of time in the gym, worked extremely hard to try to get my body right. It held up really well through Rome through to Wimbledon and it feels pretty good right now."

Hewitt is playing doubles in Montreal with world No 2 Rafael Nadal.

"I'm looking forward to it," he said. "I like Rafa a lot. I think he's great for the game. He's got a great attitude. I don't know why the hell he would be wanting to play doubles here after all the matches he's played though. That just says how much he enjoys competing."

Czech 10th seed Berdych lost 6-4 7-5 to 20-year-old Dutchman Robin Haase, whose ranking has soared from 669th at the start of last year to 103rd.

Ljubicic was stunned 6-3 4-6 7-6 by American qualifier Wayne Odesnik, ranked 182.

But the real drama was saved for the evening session when Canas squandered a 6-4 4-0 lead against Paul-Henri Mathieu, the Frenchman winning 13 of the last 14 games to seal a 4-6 7-5 6-0 victory.

Argentine David Nalbandian, 16th seed David Ferrer of Spain, Russian No. 14 Mikhail Youzhny, American Michael Russell and Dominik Hrbaty of Slovakia all progressed.

Agencies

(China Daily 08/08/2007 page24)