The Hindu : Johansson enters third round

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Apr 18, 2002

Sport

Sport - Tennis

Johansson enters third round

MONTE CARLO April 17. Australian Open winner Thomas Johansson of Sweden raced into the third round of the Monte Carlo Masters Series on Wednesday with a 6-4, 6-1 win in 67 minutes over Austrian Stefan Koubek.

Johansson recovered strongly from a 2-4 first-set deficit and romped through the second to set up a meeting with either Argentine 12th seed Guillermo Canas or Romanian Andrei Pavel.

With top seed Lleyton Hewitt and third-seeded Russian Yevgeny Kafelnikov having lost in the opening round and defending champion Gustavo Kuerten absent through injury the first major claycourt title of the season is up for grabs.

But while Johansson and Alex Corretja of Spain, last season's French Open runner-up, booked their passage, Corretja winning 6-3, 6-3 against Italian Andrea Gaudenzi, last season's beaten finalist here, Hicham Arazi of Morocco, slumped out.

The immensely-gifted Arazi, a claycourt specialist, ran into Argentine-in-a-hurry Juan Ignacio Chela on a good day for his rival, Chela winning 6-1, 6-1 - the same result he had posted in the opening round against Swedish 14th seed Thomas Enqvist.

Joining Johansson, Corretja and Chela in the next round was Czech 11th seed Jiri Nova, who ran down French qualifier Nicolas Coutelot 3-6, 6-2, 6-3.

Leander loses early

In the doubles section, India's Leander Paes and John-Laffnie de Jager of South Africa crashed to a 2-6, 0-6 defeat at the hands of the top-seeded Donald Johnson and Jared Palmer of the U.S. in the doubles first round.

The results: Thomas Johansson bt Austrian Stefan Koubek6-4, 6-1; Alex Corretja bt Andrea Gaudenzi 6-3, 6-3; Juan Ignacio Chela bt Hicham Arazi 6-1, 6-1.

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