Top Seeds Djokovic and Serena Advance to Rogers Cup Third Round at Montreal & Toronto

Montreal had incessant rains on Tuesday and several matches had to be deferred to another time. However, Novak Djokovic could finish his match against Thomaz Bellucci and won it in two sets. Defending champion Jo-Wilfried Tsonga also finished his suspended match against Croatia’s Borna Coric with a win. 8th seeded Milos Raonic fell at the first hurdle against Croatia’s Ivo Karlovic. In two other upsets, 12th seeded Kevin Anderson lost against Czech Republic’s Lukas Rosol and world no.18 Dominic Thiem of Austria lost to Latvia’s Ernests Gulbis.. In three interesting matches, Nick Kyrgios defeated Fernando Verdasco; Jack Sock defeated Adrian Mannarino and Jeremy Chardy overpowered Nicolas Mahut. In women’s matches at Toronto, top seed Serena Williams moved ahead with a victory over Italian Flavia Pennetta. Canadian Eugenie Bouchard fell in the first round against Belinda Bencic of Switzerland; no.15 seed Sara Errani advanced further after defeating Frenchwoman Kristina Mladenovic; Britain’s Heather Watson entered the second round by beating USA’s Irina Falconi and Slovakia’s Dominika Cibulkova defeated USA’s Sloane Stephens.

Top seed Novak Djokovic eased into the third round with a 6-3, 7-6 victory over Brazil’s Thomaz Bellucci. It was the Serbian’s 1000th win of his career and also the 250th in the Masters. Djokovic dominated the first set while he won the second 7-4 in the tiebreak. In the second evening session, big-serving Croat Ivo Karlovic caused a major upheaval by defeating 8th seeded Canadian Milos Raonic. On the Centre Court at Uniprix Stadium, Karlovic took the match away from Raonic in two consecutive tiebreaks 7-6, 7-6. The opportunistic Karlovic sent down 22 aces to Raonic’s 12 and forced 10 break-point chances against the Canadian, who couldn’t earn a single break opportunity. Karlovic won 90% of his first serves and that made the big difference.

Vasek Pospisil is the last Canadian standing after he won his first round match 6-4, 6-3 against Taiwan’s Yen-Hsun Lu. Pospisil’s next opponent will be the big-serving American and no.16 seed John Isner. Latvia’s world no.87 Ernests Gulbis defeated Austria’s world no.18 Dominic Thiem 3-6, 7-6, 6-1. Defending champion Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France completed his unfinished encounter against Croatia’s world no.36 Borna Coric with a 6-4, 6-4 victory. But there was a hard-fought battle between temperamental Australian Nick Kyrgios and Spain’s Fernando Verdasco. In a match that saw 25 aces and 9 service breaks, the Australian finally came through with a 6-3, 4-6, 6-4 victory. In another exciting fight, USA’s Jack Sock outlasted Frenchman Adrian Mannarino 6-2, 2-6, 7-6.

In other notable matches, no.12 seed Kevin Anderson of South Africa lost 6-7, 6-7 against Lukas Rosol of the Czech Republic; Jeremy Chardy of France defeated compatriot Nicolas Mahut 6-2, 6-4; no.13 seed David Goffin of Belgium beat USA’s Steve Johnson 6-2, 6-2; no.14 seed Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov defeated Ukraine’s Alexandr Dolgopolov 6-4, 7-5 and Spain’s Roberto Bautista Agut beat Serbia’s Janko Tipsarevic 6-3, 6-4.

In the women’s tournament at Toronto, no.1 seed Serena Williams began her campaign with a first set loss. Serena also lost her serve early in the second set but the world no.1 found her game to bounce back strongly with a 2-6, 6-3, 6-0 win over Italy’s over Flavia Pennetta. There were heart breaks for spectators, when the Canadian Eugenie Bouchard fell in the first round against Belinda Bencic of Switzerland. The match began with Bouchard being handed a bagel in the first set and was down a match point in the second. Just when it seemed that the match was coming to an end, Bouchard bounced back to take the second set. The Canadian, however, couldn’t carry the momentum in the third set and lost the match to the Swiss 0-6, 7-5, 2-6.

In other women’s singles matches at Toronto, no.15 seed Italian Sara Errani defeated Kristina Mladenovic of France 5-7, 6-1, 6-0; Great Britain’s Heather Watson beat USA’s Irina Falconi 6-1, 6-2; Slovakia’s Dominika Cibulkova defeated USA’s Sloane Stephens 6-3, 6-4; Bulgaria’s Victoria Azarenka defeated Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina 6-1, 6-4 and Frenchwoman Alize Cornet disposed of no.9 seeded Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro 6-3, 6-7, 6-4.