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INDIAN WELLS, California: World’s number one Roger Federer, in
search of his first title of 2008, took no chances Sunday as he
moved smoothly into the third round of the Indian Wells Masters
Series.
The top-seeded Swiss, who enjoyed a first-round
bye, defeated Spain’s Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 6-3, 6-2 in his first
ATP outing since a first-round ouster at Dubai last week.
“I haven’t played much, this is the
difficulty,” Federer said. “Every first round you play at a big
tournament is always a bit of pressure if you’re number one seed.
I wasn’t nervous or anything . . . you just have a tendency to be
a bit more unsure because you don’t know the conditions that well
yet.”
While Federer began to gather steam, red-hot
Andy Roddick was cooled off by Germany’s Tommy Haas, who used a
break in each set to win, 6-4, 6-4.
Roddick had come into the tournament on a high,
with titles in San Jose and last week in Dubai already to his credit
this year.
But after enjoying a first-round bye he fell at
the first hurdle of this $5.7million tournament.
Fourth-seeded Russian Nikolay Davydenko
advanced, defeating US wild card John Isner 6-2, 7-6 (7/3).
Seventh-seeded Argentinian David Nalbandian also advanced, defeating
Latvia’s Ernests Gulbis 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (7/4), and 11th-seeded Scot
Andy Murray rallied to beat Austrian Jurgen Melzer 3-6, 6-3, 6-3.
In women’s play, Australian Open champion
Maria Sharapova, the fourth seed, moved into the fourth round with a
7-5, 6-3 victory over Greece’s Eleni Daniilidou. Sharapova next
faces Ukrainian Alona Bondarenko, who ousted former world’s number
one Amelie Mauresmo 6-1, 6-2.
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