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The Sports Network
Montpellier, France (Sports Network) - French favorites Gilles Simon and
Richard Gasquet were among Wednesday's second-round winners at the Open Sud de
France tennis tournament.
The second-seeded world No. 12 Simon subdued Italian Flavio Cipolla 6-3, 6-2,
while a fourth-seeded Gasquet, ranked 16th in the world, grounded wild card
and fading former world No. 3 Nikolay Davydenko of Russia 6-3, 6-4 on the
indoor hardcourts at The Arena. Simon and Gasquet enjoyed byes into the second
round here.
"He's not the No. 3 he was a few years ago, but he can still dazzle sometimes,
and you can easily find yourself a break down against him," Gasquet said of
Davydenko. "So it was important to hold my serve."
Simon's quarterfinal opponent on Friday will be wild card and fellow Frenchman
Guillaume Rufin, while Gasquet will face seventh-seeded German Philipp
Kohlschreiber.
An upset came when Rufin smacked 16 aces and ousted fifth-seeded Spaniard
Feliciano Lopez 7-6 (7-5), 6-3, while Kohlschreiber avoided an upset by
handling France's Edouard Roger-Vasselin 6-4, 7-5 on Day 3.
In some second-round action on Thursday, top-seeded Czech slugger Tomas
Berdych will take on French qualifier Florent Serra and third-seeded Frenchman
Gael Monfils will battle American Michael Russell. Monfils titled here two
years ago.
The winner of this $518,000 tournament will collect $95,000.
The Sports Network