Raonic Ruthless In Roland Garros Opener
Fifth seed Milos Raonic struck 44 winners, including 15 aces, past Belgian Steve Darcis in a 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 victory over one hour and 31 minutes on Monday at Roland Garros. Raonic’s best performance at the clay-court Grand Slam championship was a run to the 2014 quarter-finals (l. to Djokovic).
“It's always good to start and to be as efficient as possible,” said Raonic, who will next face Rogerio Dutra Silva or 2010 quarter-finalist Mikhail Youzhny. “I was able to break relatively early in all three sets and just sort of go about my business throughout the whole match. So I'm happy with that, and it gives me a little more freedom to spend more time working on my game tomorrow and playing hopefully even better on Wednesday.”
Georgian Nikoloz Basilashvili, who reached the semi-finals at last week’s Open Parc Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Lyon (l. to Tsonga) continued his rich form when he knocked out No. 31 seed Gilles Simon of France, 1-6, 6-2, 6-4, 6-1. Basilashvili, who jumped eight spots to No. 63 in the latest Emirates ATP Rankings today, goes onto challenge Viktor Troicki, who defeated Evgeny Donskoy 7-6(6), 6-4, 6-0, in the second round.
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“He started off very strongly with winners, and then he finished with winners, as well,” said Simon. “To start with, I was trying to be in the match and to fight for this match and see how long it would last.”
Jiri Vesely proved too strong for No. 14 seed Jack Sock in a gritty 7-5, 7-5, 6-3 win over two hours and 45 minutes, while Sock’s American compatriot, Ryan Harrison, fell to Aljaz Bedene 6-4, 6-0, 3-6, 6-1. "I think the three sets I won I was really solid," said Bedene. "The third set wasn't the best. Basically, I gave one game away too easily. The first set was tougher than expected [and] in the second set I played really well."
Steve Johnson, whose father passed away earlier this month, admitted his 6-3, 6-3, 6-7(4), 6-7(3), 6-3 first-round victory over Yuichi Sugita was “probably one of the harder matches I've played”. The American No. 25 seed, added, “The last two weeks of tennis haven't been about tennis for me.” He now plays #NextGenATP Croatian Borna Coric, who overcame France's Mathias Bourgue 7-6(5), 6-3, 6-2.
Elsewhere, 17th seed-seeded Spaniard Roberto Bautista Agut worked his way past John Millman of Australian 6-2, 6-2, 0-6, 6-1 in two hours and 13 minutes for a second-round meeting against Mikhail Kukushkin.
Go inside the tournament at RolandGarros.com.