Monaco, Cilic continue winning ways in Hamburg

18 Jul 2012 04:04:06

Argentina's Juan Monaco and Croatian Marin Cilic advanced through to the second round at the German Tennis Championships on Tuesday.

Third seed Monaco overcame local hope Cedrik-Marcel Stebe 6-4 3-6 7-5, while fourth seed Cilic swept aside Italy's Flavio Cipolla 6-3 6-4 on the red clay in Hamburg.

Monaco, ranked 14th in the world, converted six of 12 break point opportunities before wrapping up the contest in two hours and 41 minutes.

Cilic converted 70 percent of his first serves on his way to recording a 13th victory in 14 matches.

The world number 15 has won two of his past three tournaments, with success at the AEGON Championships in London and last week's Croatia Open in Umag.

In other matches, Spanish top seed Nicolas Almagro made light work of German Tobias Kamke with a 6-4 6-1 win.

Local wildcard Julian Reister stunned Spanish fifth seed Fernando Verdasco 6-2 6-3.

Emerging Czech Lukas Rosol, who famously ousted Spaniard Rafael Nadal in the second round at Wimbledon in June, rallied to beat Serbian eighth seed Viktor Troicki 5-7 6-3 6-4.

German sixth seed Philipp Kohlschreiber defeated countryman Bjorn Phau 4-6 6-2 6-3, while seventh seed Florian Mayer outclassed Argentine Horacio Zeballos 7-6 (9-7) 7-5.

Tommy Haas capped a largely successful day for the Germans, winning 6-2 6-1 over Slovakian Martin Klizan.

Frenchman Jeremy Chardy beat Spain's Albert Montanes 6-4 6-2, while Fabio Fognini of Italy proved too strong for Turkey's Marsel Ilhan with a 7-5 6-2 victory.

Spaniard Albert Ramos defeated countryman Pablo Andujar 6-1 6-4.