Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau began their campaign for a second title at the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament in Rotterdam with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Feliciano Lopez and Marc Lopez on Tuesday

The 2015 champions converted all three break point opportunities they created against the Spaniards, with a 74 per cent success rate on serve. The Dutch-Romanian duo await the winners of the Centre Court match as Robin Haase and Matwe Middelkoop face fellow Dutch wild card pairing Jasper Smit and Jesse Timmermans.

Oliver Marach and Mate Pavic survived a huge first-round test to beat local favourites Sander Arends and Thiemo De Bakker 6-4, 1-6, 11-9. Undefeated in 2018 with three tournament wins, the second seeds were taken all the way by the Dutch qualifiers, but proved their strength to win their fourth Match Tie-break of the year. Marach and Pavic will next meet Damir Dzumhur and Filip Krajinovic for a place in the semi-finals.

Did You Know?
Marach and Pavic’s three previous Match Tie-break wins in 2018 all came en route to winning the ASB Classic in Auckland.

Ryan Harrison’s start to remember in 2018 continued on Monday at the New York Open. The Louisiana native outplayed compatriot Donald Young 6-3, 7-6(4) to advance to the second round in Long Island.

This is the first ATP World Tour tournament on Long Island since 2004 when the tennis took place in August, one week before the US Open. This year’s tournament is being played at the NYCB Live, home of the Nassau Coliseum. Harrison won the 2017 Memphis Open, the former name of this ATP World Tour tournament (d. Basilashvili).

“A tricky match… I was serving well early and that was able to get me through a lot of early mistakes and missed opportunities with some early break points,” he said.

Harrison improved to 7-2 on the year. He reached the final at the Sydney International (l. to Kyrgios) and the third round at the Australian Open (l. to Cilic). Harrison will next meet Croatian Ivo Karlovic, who hit 20 aces to prevail past Harrison’s countryman Jared Donaldson 6-4, 7-6(4).  “I started well. That helped me at the beginning of the match because I knew I could do well against him,” Karlovic said.

#NextGenATP compatriot Frances Tiafoe celebrated his first tour-level win of the season, beating junior World No. 1 Sebastian Korda, the son of 1998 Australian Open champion Petr Korda, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2. Petr Korda also won the Hamlet Cup in Long Island in 1992 for one of his 10 singles titles.

Tiafoe, a favourite to make the 2018 Next Gen ATP Finals in Milan, fell in the first round at the Brisbane International presented by Suncorp and the Australian Open. Sebastian Korda, 17, was making his tour-level debut. The 6’4” right-hander won the Australian Open boys’ singles title last month to rise to No. 1 in the junior rankings.

“He’s playing great tennis. I congratulate him on winning the Australian Open. He’s going to have a great career,” Tiafoe said.

Tiafoe will next face Israeli Dudi Sela, who beat eighth seed Nikoloz Basilashvili, 6-4, 6-4.

Neal Skupski has started his 2018 much like he finished 2017. At the end of last season, he teamed with brother Ken Skupski to make the ATP Challenger Tour final in Eckental, Germany, and triumph in Bratislava, Slovakia. The brothers then captured the trophy two weeks ago at another Challenger in Quimper, France. But this past week, Neal achieved his greatest result to date, joining Ken again to win his first tour-level title at the Open Sud de France in Montpellier.

Skupski spoke to ATPWorldTour.com upon his arrival at the New York Open, where he is competing alongside 91-time tour-level titlist Daniel Nestor.

How does it feel to be an ATP World Tour champion?
It’s unbelievable. It’s obviously a dream come true to win an ATP event with your brother. Ken’s won three before, but never with me. We came very close four years ago in Moscow. We had match points… it’s nice to finally get over the line and hopefully win a few more together before the year ends.

Beating the second seeds in your opener and the fourth seeds in the final, how incredible was the whole week for you?
Going into it, I think we were one of the last teams to get into the tournament. Playing against the No. 2 seeds you have nothing to lose, really. We go into that match, we come out on top and take a lot of confidence from that and just took the momentum from round to round.

Did your brother say anything to you before match point?
Yeah, I think he did but I can’t quite remember. The last game went by pretty quickly. I held to love, all four first serves in. I couldn’t have asked for a better game, really. I was pretty nervous about it but once we got over the line there was a lot of hugging going on. My brother and I were pretty happy.

What were the first comments he made after you won?
He did say he was very proud of me, but obviously it was a team effort. It was our first time winning a title, he was proud of that. It was great for the whole family. We worked really hard to get to this point. But hopefully this is just the first one, hopefully there are more to come.

Making the quarter-finals at Wimbledon was special to you. How does this achievement compare?
It’s very difficult. Obviously playing at Wimbledon is very special, it’s your home Grand Slam. We beat some great teams on the way there. You go into the Grand Slam thinking to win a couple rounds. But to make the quarter-finals was incredible. Ever since that we’ve gained a lot of confidence. Toward the end of the year we changed sides. I’m on the ad side, Ken’s on the deuce side now. That’s done really well. Our first tournament we made the final of Eckental, Germany. Won Bratislava, then Quimper and now we’ve won Montpellier. So it’s gone well so far on these sides.

This week you’re playing with a 91-time tour-level champion, Daniel Nestor for the first time. How exciting is that to you?
He’s a lefty, which is going to help a little bit. I’m going to be listening to him the whole week. He’s definitely got a lot of things to tell me, hopefully not too much (laughs). But it’s going to be an honour to play with Daniel this week. It’s nice to play with him before he finishes. But yeah, hopefully we could get some good practices in before we start.

Two-time Argentina Open quarter-finalist Federico Delbonis broke five times to advance to the second round in Buenos Aires on Monday. The 27-year-old left-hander, making his eighth appearance at the Argentina Open, beat Germany’s Florian Mayer 7-6(4), 6-4.

Delbonis will next meet Portugal’s Gastao Elias or Spaniard Roberto Carballes Baena, who won his maiden ATP World Tour title at the Ecuador Open in Quito on Sunday.

In other action, Delbonis’ countryman Guido Pella also moved into the second round, beating countryman Nicolas Kicker 2-6, 6-4, 6-4. Serbia’s Dusan Lajovic knocked out Argentine qualifier Facundo Bagnis 7-6(4), 6-1; Spaniard Guillermo Garcia-Lopez swept wild card Carlos Berlocq of Argentina 6-3, 6-3; and Brazilian qualifier Thomaz Bellucci dropped only three games against Argentine wild card Pedro Cachin 6-2, 6-1.

Bjorn Fratangelo, the World No. 109 who advanced to the semi-finals at the 2017 Dell Technologies Hall of Fame Open in Newport, Rhode Island, qualified for the inaugural New York Open on Monday with a third-set tie-break victory against #NextGenATP Kazakh Alexander Bublik.

The 24-year-old American spoke to ATPWorldTour.com about his favourite things to do off the court, who he admires most and more:

What’s your biggest passion outside of sport and why?
I would say food. I come from a big Italian family and I actually really enjoy cooking every time I’m back home, which isn’t too often. I always try to work on my cooking skills.

Favourite dish?
Steak and some sort of side.

What was the last book you read?
I would say Rafael Nadal’s autobiography.

Last concert or show you attended?
I was at a concert in Boca Raton a couple years ago. They had a bunch of people: The Fray, Colbie Caillat, the Goo Goo Dolls, it was like a big mix.

Favourite sport to watch besides tennis?
I would have to say basketball or I’m a big Pittsburgh Penguins fan, probably ice hockey.

Outside of your family, whom do you admire most?
If I’m going tennis I’ve got to say Roger Federer. To accomplish everything he has and he still wants to keep going, I don’t know why or how but he still wants to keep doing it and I think that’s pretty admirable.

My tennis career will be a success if ___________
If I just keep working hard and make sure everybody knows that when they play me it’s going to be a tough out and keep getting my feet wet at this level.

After my tennis career, I want to ___________
I think I want to stay in the game. I would like to stay in tennis to do what, I don’t know. But I love the sport. I love everything about it and I definitely want to stay in it.

Alexander Zverev advanced to the second round of the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament with a 6-4, 6-3 win over David Ferrer on Monday. The 20-year-old Zverev needed one hour and 24 minutes to dispatch the veteran Spaniard.

“It’s not easy to play Ferrer, especially in the first round of a tournament,” Zverev said. “This is a tough tournament, and I’m happy with the win.”

While Zverev struggled with his serve, he still managed to save nine of 11 break point opportunities. He also converted on five of six break-point opportunities (2/11 for Ferrer). Both committed an uncharacteristic number of unforced errors (Zverev, 26; Ferrer, 31).

“The court is quite quick and the balls are bouncing low. I’m quite tall so a low bounce is difficult but I like quick courts. I’ve won a lot of tournaments on quick courts,” Zverev said. “I want to make my game more dimensional. I felt good returning; I felt well in the long rallies.”

With the win, Zverev moves to 1-2 lifetime in his FedEx ATP Head2Head series against Ferrer. He’ll next face Italian Andreas Seppi, who beat Portugal’s Joao Sousa 6-4, 1-6, 6-2.