Federer Stretched, Hewitt, Gaudio Exit at Indian Wells

Posted on March 15, 2006

World No. 1 Roger Federer hopes he got the bugs out of his game Tuesday at the Masters Series-Indian Wells, going to the can of roach spray to eliminate the scrambling Belgian Olivier "The Roach" Rochus 3-6, 6-2, 7-5 to advance into the fourth round at the first Masters Series event of 2006.

"You can't be ready to win in straight sets, otherwise you're badly prepared," said Federer, who made a startling 59 unforced errors and needed the drama of a break in the final game to stop the Belgian's upset big. "I always expect a tough one and this one was. I never got my game going, and once you're down a set, you're not allowed to make any more mistakes. I'm relieved I'm through."

Federer improved to 18-1 on the season with the victory, and in the fourth round will face No. 16-seeded Frenchman Richard Gasquet, one of only four players to beat him in 2005, with the teen straight-setting No. 19 Dominik Hrbaty.

Two Top 10 seeds exited the event Tuesday when No. 7 Gaston Gaudio failed to put away (25) Marcos Baghdatis after winning the first set, losing 6-2 in the third, and (9) Lleyton Hewitt's efforts to end a year-plus title drought took a hit when the Aussie was overpowered in straight sets by (23) Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic.

"He was serving big out there. I just felt like I couldn't dictate play," said last year's runner-up Hewitt, who will likely drop back out of the Top 10 again this year on the ATP Rankings. "He's got a lot of firepower and he moves extremely well for a big guy as well. I didn't serve as well as I needed to. That's something that I've got to try and work on, get the percentages up there and get the cheap points. That's when I play my best tennis."

Other winners were (2) Rafael Nadal (d. (WC) Fish giving up five games), (6) Ivan Ljubicic (d. (27) Monfils) setting up a fourth-round encounter with Croatian countryman (21) Mario Ancic (d. Mathieu), and (20) Sebastien Grosjean (d. Malisse in three).

Winning in third-set match tiebreaks Tuesday in doubles were (1) Bryan/Bryan (d. Bhupathi/Moodie), (2) Bjorkman/Mirnyi (d. Acasuso/Prieto), (6) Santoro/Zimonjic (d. Lindstedt/Nieminen, saving 4 match points), and (WC) Goldstein/Thomas (d. Safin/Wawrinka).

On the Wednesday schedule in IW are (3) Roddick vs. Andreev, (1) Federer vs. (16) Gasquet, (20) Grosjean vs. (2) Nadal, (26) Haas vs. Blake, (25) Baghdatis vs. (23) Berdych, (4) Nalbandian vs. Srichaphan, (21) Ancic vs. (6) Ljubicic in an all-Croatian, and (22) Nieminen vs. Safin.