Federer, Nadal Headline Day 3 In Paris
Roger Federer’s bid to add to his lone BNP Paribas Masters title from 2011 begins today when the Swiss No. 3 seed takes on his 2015 Australian Open nemesis Andreas Seppi in the second round. The 35 year old is coming off a return to No. 2 in the Emirates ATP Race To London after his seventh Basel title, where he defeated Rafael Nadal in the final.
It brought his win-loss record in finals this season to 6-4, with his only losses coming to Novak Djokovic at ATP Masters 1000 Indian Wells, ATP Masters 1000 Rome, Wimbledon and the US Open. Federer fell to Milos Raonic for the first time in the Paris qurater-finals last year. He will carry a 12-1 FedEx ATP Head2Head record into his match with Seppi, who opened on Monday with a 7-5, 6-3 win over Pablo Cuevas.
The Italian is trying to reach the third round for the second time (after 2011). He started the season with a 10-4 win-loss record, highlighted by his first win against Federer in the third round at Melbourne Park before falling to Nick Kyrgios 8-6 in the fifth.
After his run to the Basel final on Sunday Nadal arrives in the French capital having risen to No. 5 in the Race To London. En route to the title match in Switzerland, the Spaniard held off his 2012 Wimbledon conqueror Lukas Rosol in a third-set tie-break. The pair will lock horns for a fourth time (Nadal leads 3-1) on Wednesday after the Czech opened with a 6-2, 2-6, 6-3 win over Spaniard Guillermo Garcia-Lopez. Rosol beat No. 10 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the second round in Vienna to snap a 14-match losing streak against Top-10 opponents. Nadal has a 3-3 record in finals this season but needs to win here in Paris to continue his streak of winning at least one ATP Masters 1000 title a year since 2005.
No. 2 seed Andy Murray will be out to avenge a defeat to Croatian teenager Borna Coric when the pair meets on Wednesday. The Scot was soundly beaten by the 18 year old in the quarter-finals in Dubai earlier in the season and returns to action for the first time since reaching the semi-finals at the Shanghai Rolex Masters. Murray has won four titles this season on three surfaces and will like his chances against Coric should he win the first set. He has a perfect 55-0 record this season after claiming the opening set. Coric, the youngest player in the Top 50, won his first-round match on Tuesday against Fernando Verdasco 6-4, 6-4. His 26 wins in 2015 are most among teenagers on tour.
Japanese sixth seed Kei Nishikori will take on local Jeremy Chardy in a tricky second-round clash. The pair is tied at 2-2 in prior meetings but they have not played so far this season. Nishikori has three titles to his name this year and returns to play having withdrawn from Basel last week with a shoulder injury. He is the last player to secure one of the eight places at the ATP World Tour Finals in London. Chardy opened with a 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 win over countryman Lucas Pouille on Tuesday.
Another Frenchman, No. 10 seed Richard Gasquet, will meet Leonardo Mayer for the first time after the Argentine downed Martin Klizan on Monday. Gasquet’s Davis Cup teammate, No. 9 seed Tsonga, faces Spaniard Roberto Bautista Agut, having narrowly claimed the pair’s only prior match in Montreal this year. Tsonga comes off a strong showing in Shanghai, where he defeated Nadal en route to the final, while Bautista Agut has reached back-to-back finals in Moscow and Valencia before his first-round win on Tuesday against Pierre-Hugues Herbert.
In other second-round encounters, 16th seed David Goffin and Serbian qualifier Dusan Lajovic meet for the first time, Grigor Dimitrov and 12th seed Marin Cilic square off and 13th seed John Isner takes on qualifier Aljaz Bedene. Fifth seed Tomas Berdych plays qualifier Edoard Roger-Vasselin, 15th seed Feliciano Lopez meets Viktor Troicki and 11th seed Kevin Anderson will look to maintain his unbeaten record against Dominic Thiem.
Leading the five doubles matches on Court 2 are top seeds and two-time defending champions Bob and Mike Bryan, No. 3 seeds and Wimbledon champions Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau and No. 4 Jamie Murray and John Peers. The oldest player on tour, 43-year-old Daniel Nestor, attempts to win his 1000th career doubles match when he and Roger-Vasselin take on Rojer-Tecau.