Almagro, Crivoi, Brands Reach Vienna Second Round

© Wr. Stadthalle/Bildagentur ZollesNicolas Almagro is making his fourth appearance in Vienna.

ATP World Tour No. 28 Nicolas Almagro came close to suffering his fourth first-round exit at the Bank Austria TennisTrophy Monday, but rallied to defeat Australian Peter Luczak 5-7, 7-6(3), 6-1 to reach the second round of the ATP World Tour 250 indoor hard-court tennis tournament in Vienna.

The Spaniard struck 20 aces to Luczak’s 15 and broke serve just once more than his opponent in the pair’s first meeting, which lasted two hours and 14 minutes. He bowed out in the first round on his first three visits to Vienna in 2005 (l. to Eitzinger), ’06 (l. to Moya) and ’07 (l. to Fish).

The 24-year-old Almagro improved to a 28-21 match record on the season, highlighted by capturing his fifth ATP World Tour title at the Abierto Mexicano Telcel (d. Monfils) and four further quarter-final efforts.

Almagro next will face American Wayne Odesnik, who edged Czech qualifier Lukas Rosol 6-2, 5-7, 7-6(6) in a match featuring seven breaks of serve and 20 aces.

World No. 106 Victor Crivoi snapped a five-match tour-level losing streak with a 6-3, 6-3 victory over Jan Hernych of the Czech Republic in 70 minutes.  Crivoi won 70 per cent of service points and hit three aces to record his first ATP World Tour win since reaching the Allianz Suisse Open Gstaad quarter-finals (l. to A. Beck) in July.

German Daniel Brands avenged his five-set Roland Garros first round defeat to Robert Kendrick on Monday, beating the No. 80-ranked American 7-6(5), 7-5 in 77 minutes.  Brands saved two of three break points he faced and hit 13 aces, while Kendrick won 73 per cent of his service points and hit 16 aces.  World No. 125 Brands reached the BMW Open semi-finals at Munich (l. to Youzhny) in May.

Portugal’s Frederico Gil set up a potential second-round clash with second seed Radek Stepanek after defeating Austrian wild card Stefan Koubek 4-6, 6-4, 6-4 in a match featuring seven breaks of serve. The No. 70-ranked Gil won his first ATP World Tour match since reaching the third round at Pilot Pen Tennis (l. to Andreev) in August.