Rogers Cup – Chela Out Gasquet and Petzschner into second round

Written by: Global Chick on 10th August 2011

Rogers Cup – Chela Out Gasquet and Petzschner into second round

Richard Gasquet from France cheers during the Davis Cup World Group quarter final match against Germany's Florian Mayer in Stuttgart, Germany, 08 July 2011. Mayer lost by 6-4, 6-4, 5-7, 3-6 and 3-6. The ninth Davis Cup duel between Germany and France takes place between 08 and 10 July 2011. EPA/Marijan Murat |

Former World No. 15 Argentine Juan Ignacio Chela crashed out to Canadian wildcard Vasek Pospisil in the first round in three sets 4-6 6-3 6-4 today at the Rogers Cup in Montréal.

Pospisil is ranked No. 155 on the ATP Tour Rankings. Last week he reached the semi-final of the Vancouver $100 000 ATP Challenger where he lost to James Ward of Britain.

The Canadian wildcard has now set up a second round clash with tennis supreme Roger Federer. The 21-year-old has mostly played on the Future and Challenger circuit.

France’s Richard Gasquet reached the second round after taking out Germany’s Florian Mayer 6-2 6-3. The Frenchman saved fives break points.

This is Gasquet’s 250^th career victory. The World No. 13 is yet to win a title this year. He reached the semi-final at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 in Rome and lost to Rafael Nadal in two sets. His latest tournament win came in Nice in 2010. That same year he was the runner up in Sydney and Gstaad.

Next up for Gasquet is Brazilian Thomaz Bellucci who reached the second round by defeating Andrey Golubev of Kazakhstan 7-5 7-6 (6).

“I went through a period when I was losing matches, but I still practised a lot. Little by little I started playing better and winning matches. The victories added up and I became more and more confident,” Gasquet said of his climb in the rankings to No.13.

American qualifier Michael Russell has set up a clash with Stanislas Wawrinka after a great win over Albert Montanes 7-5 6-2.

Qualifier Philipp Petzschner of Germany marched in to the second round when he took out the number nine seed Gilles Simon of France 7-5 6-2.

The Frenchman blamed the loss on his stiff neck, “I did the best I could, wichi was not much today. My neck got stiff during practice and I was not able to play as I wanted.” Simon is hoping his neck will get better before next week’s tournament in Cincinnati.

Petzschner and Karlovic will face each other in the second round.