Federer and Murray move up

Second seed Roger Federer downed Michael Llodra 6-0, 7-6 and entered the second round of the Dubai Open at the Dubai Tennis Stadium on Tuesday. World number two Federer broke Llodra thrice in the first set and went on to win it 6-0 within just 17 minutes In second set, Llodra showed some signs of recovery after breaking him once and leveling the Swiss maestro. He also took the point in the fifth game but his efforts fell short against Federer as the match went to a tiebreaker during which the Llorda had set point on the second seed’s serve, but he was eventually beaten after a drop shot allowed Federer as easy backhand winner. Federer will meet Feliciano Lopez, who beat Nicolas Mahut 6-4, 6-4. Third seed Andy Murray survived Michael Berrer scare 6-3, 4-6, 6-4 and advanced to the second round. World number four from Britain recovered from a set down to beat German qualifier Berrer in the battle continued on court one for more than two hours. Murray, playing his first match since losing to Novak Djokovic in the Australian Open semi-finals, dropped serve in the opening game but broke back twice and claimed the first set. Fourth seed and world number six Jo-Wilfried Tsonga of France had to dug deep to overcome Marcos Baghdatis of Cypriot 7-6, 6-4. In other first round matches, Italian Flavio Cipolla sent 2005 runner-up Ivan Ljubicic packing 6-2, 7-5, Mikhail Youzhny defeated Richard Gasquet when the latter retired with the flu after losing the first set 6-3 and Sergiy Stakhovsky took just 36 minutes to beat UAE’s Omar Awadhy 6-1, 6-2. From gulftoday