Five more first round matches take the indoor hardcourts Tuesday at the €680,250 IF Stockholm Open.
Two players who have struggled this year are up first on Centre Court, as Mario Ancic plays Amer Delic. After a career year last year and a strong start to this season, Ancic retired during his first round match in Marseille in February due to illness and subsequently missed six months of play with mononucleosis). He returned at the ATP Masters Series events in Montreal and Cincinnati (making the second round at both) and fell first round at New Haven before pulling out of the US Open with a shoulder injury; now he begins his fall season in Stockholm, where his best result in two previous attempts was the quarterfinals in 2003. Delic enjoyed an impressive first half of 2007, highlighted by a run to the fourth round of the ATP Masters Series event in Miami (notching his first Top 10 victory over Nikolay Davydenko en route) and attaining a career-high ranking of No. 60 just after Wimbledon. But an eight-match losing streak in ATP tournaments since then has seen him plummet to No. 85 as of this week. He is playing in Stockholm for the first time.
Up next, No. 4 seed Tommy Haas will try to continue his mastery over unseeded Olivier Rochus, having won both of the pair’s previous meetings in straight sets. Haas has had another excellent season, winning his 11th career ATP singles title in Memphis and performing well at the majors, including his third career semifinal at that level at the Australian Open (his first two Grand Slam semifinals also came down under). Since an impressive run to the US Open quarterfinals (where he ousted World No. 6 James Blake before falling to Davydenko), Haas has struggled somewhat, getting crushed by Igor Andreev in Davis Cup play and crashing out of Bangkok in the second round last week; but he holds fond memories of Stockholm, reaching the semifinals in his most recent appearance three years ago (falling to Andre Agassi). Until two weeks ago, Rochus hadn’t passed the quarterfinals of an ATP event this year in three tries; but in Mumbai he changed that by reaching his sixth career ATP final (falling to Richard Gasquet). The Belgian has also reached the quarterfinals or better in his last three appearances here, including a semifinal run in 2005.
Top seed and two-time defending champion James Blake faces unseeded Jonas Bjorkman. Not only is Blake coming off a scintillating summer hardcourt season, where he won 20 of 24 matches and picked up his second ATP title of the year at New Haven (having won his first of the year at Sydney in January), but he is also a perfect 10-0 in Stockholm, going 5-0 en route to the 2005 title (beating Paradorn Srichaphan in the final) and 5-0 for the 2006 title (beating Jarkko Nieminen in the final). He has also beaten his next opponent, Bjorkman, in straight sets in both of their previous encounters. But the Swedish veteran does have a few sources of inspiration - he has 21 career wins over Top 10 players (in completed matches) and has played this event 14 times before, winning it once back in 1997 and reaching the quarterfinals in four of his other appearances. He has notched one of his career Top 10 wins at this event, dispatching then-No. 3 Patrick Rafter en route to his 1997 title; but he hasn’t had a Top 10 win in just over two years.
The last match on Centre Court pits non-seeds Juan Martin del Potro and Thomas Johansson against each other. Having made his ATP debut just last season and finished at No. 91, del Potro has risen even higher this year, reaching his first semifinal at Adelaide in January and just recently cracking the Top 50 (spending two weeks at No. 50 right after a third round finish at the US Open). Johansson has reached the quarterfinals just once this year but can draw confidence from his previous record at this tournament; he is 20-11 lifetime here, winning the title twice, in 2000 and 2004. del Potro is making his debut here.
In the only other singles match of the day, No. 7 seed Ivo Karlovic takes on unseeded Nicolas Massu out on Court 1. Karlovic has gone from No. 98 to No. 25 this year; Massu has gone from No. 44 to No. 74. (ATP Digital Services)
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