SHANGHAI, China - Seven days after a premature first-round exit at Beijing's China Open, American Andy Roddick managed to piece together a 6-2, 3-6, 6-2 win over Taiwan's Lu Yen-hsun to advance to the second round of the 2011 Shanghai Rolex Masters.
After dominating the first set with his signature powerful serves that clocked up to 136 mph, Roddick, 29, fell behind in the second set, visibly flustered with Lu's serve and volley approach.
With the match tied at one set apiece, the tenth-seeded Roddick collected himself, keeping the mistakes to a minimum, and eventually broke Lu's serve twice in the third set to win his first match in Shanghai after a thigh injury forced him to retire in the second round of last year's tournament.
"I played better... we've played seven times, and unfortunately everyone only remembers one," explained Roddick in reference to his 2010 Wimbledon fourth-round loss to Lu. "I've won six of them."
While Roddick needed three sets to advance to the second round, where he will face Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov, who outlasted Turkey's Marsel Ilhan, 2-6, 6-1, 6-4, fellow American Donald Young, who only qualified for the main draw 24 hours earlier, easily dismantled Chinese wild card entrant Gong MaoXin, 6-1, 6-4.
Young, 22, a Chicago native who plays out of Atlanta, held serve throughout the entire match, and managed to break Gong in a pivotal seventh game of the second set to secure the victory. Young advances to the second round, where he will face Switzerland's Stanislas Wawrinka, who disposed of Argentinian Juan Monaco, 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, the previous evening.
Earlier in the day, 18-year old Australian, Bernard Tomic, went the distance against South Africa's Kevin Anderson, Tomic securing a hard-fought victory, 7-6 (7-5), 6-7 (4-7), 6-3. With neither player able to break the other's serve through the first two sets, Tomic withstood Anderson's 25 aces, finally breaking the 6-foot-8 South African's serve in the second game of the third set.
"He's so tough because his serve, he gets his corners, and gets you out of the court," commented Tomic. "He serves every serve and serves well. So I was happy to break him in that third and I think that's what won the match."
Tomic now advances to the second round, where he'll face world number-9, American Mardy Fish, who is coming off a semi-final loss to Rafael Nadal at last week's Japan Open, after ousting Tomic 6-7 (5-7), 6-4, 6-1, in the quarterfinals just four days ago.
Also advancing to the second round are Spain's Guillermo Garcia-Lopez, who took out India's Somdev Devvarman, 6-4, 6-3, Juan Carlos Ferrero, who defeated Russian Mikhail Youzhny, 7-6 (7-4), 6-4, Albert Montanes, who downed Kazakhstan's Mikhail Kukushkin, 6-2, 5-7, 7-6 (7-5), Tommy Robredo, who ousted Switzerland's Stephane Bohli, 7-6 (7-3), 7-6 (7-4) and Fernando Verdasco, who dropped China's Li Zhe, 6-2, 6-2. Argentina's David Nalbandian, who beat Latvian Ernests Gulbis, 7-5, 6-4, Colombia's Santiago Giraldo, who defeated Croatia's Ivan Dodig, 1-6, 6-3, 6-4, and Australian Matthew Ebden, who bested Spain's Pablo Andujar, 6-4, 6-4, also move on to the round of 32.