Black Tennis Pros

American Donald Young earned his first win at an ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament in three years as he came back to defeat Italian Potito Starace 2-6, 6-3, 6-3 in just under two hours on Thursday at the BNP Paribas Open.

The 21 year old fought off nine of 12 break points faced on serve, while delivering on four of his six opportunities against the 47th-ranked Starace.

Young, currently at No. 143 in the South African Airways 2011 ATP Rankings, reached the third round at this tournament in 2008 with wins over Bobby Reynolds and Feliciano Lopez before falling to Rafael Nadal. He next faces World No. 5 Andy Murray.

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Given that he was highly doubtful about his ability to play in the 2009 Roland Garros because of a knee injury, Frenchman Gaël Monfils has begun the tournament very impressively.

“I’m not thinking too much about my injury,” said Monfils. I decided to play. I’m going to stop talking about being hurt or not hurt. I’m in the tournament, and for once, I started at a high level. Now it’s a question of how I can build on it.”

Monfils’s impressed the crowd in the Suzanne-Lenglen court with his 6-2, 6-3, 6-1 defeat of Bobby Reynolds.

“I feel strong, and I was hitting strong,” said Monfils. “After a few more matches and with a bit more confidence, I’ll be hitting even harder. And I tell myself, why not take things further?”

“I didn’t have to dig too far into my reserves today,” Monfils said. “But I could see in the rallies we had that I was there and I hadn’t lost too much of my game.”

In the next round, he faces the Romanian Victor Crivoi.

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WOMEN'S SINGLES

Round 1

Venus Williams, USA defeated Bethanie Mattek-Sands, USA
6-1, 4-6, 6-2

Stephanie Foretz, FRA defeated by Kirsten Flipkens, BEL
1-6, 6-4, 4-6

Serena Williams, USA vs. Klara Zakopalova


WOMEN'S DOUBLES

Round 1

Venus Williams, USA and Serena Williams, USA
vs.
Andrea Hlavackova, CZE and Lucie Hradecka, CZE

Stephanie Foretz, FRA and Camille Pin, FRA
vs.
Lucie Safarova, CZE and Vladimira Uhlirova, CZE


MEN'S SINGLES

Round 1

Josselin Ouanna, FRA defeated Marcel Granollers, ESP
7-5, 2-6, 3-6, 7⁷-6², 6-1

Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, FRA vs. Julien Benneteau, FRA


Gael Monfils, FRA vs. Bobby Reynolds, USA

James Blake, USA vs. Leonardo Mayer, ARG


MEN'S DOUBLES

Round 1

Jeff Coetzee, RSA and Jordan Kerr, AUS
vs.
Jaroslav Levinsky, CZE and Igor Zelenay, SVK

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