Black Tennis Pros

The No. 11 seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga began his US Open campaign with a solid, straight-set win over Yen-Hsun Lu of Taiwan.

Tsonga showed no signs of the right arm injury that forced him to retire against world No. 1 Novak Djokovic in the semis of Montreal in early August. His serve and forehand were firing on all cylinders, at least when he needed them to, as he secured a service break in each of the first two sets and jumped out ahead in the third for a comfortable 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 win.

Tsonga, his demeanor relaxed and confident, hit seven aces, 39 winners and had 29 unforced errors. The times the No. 82-ranked Lu did challenge Tsonga on his serve, the Frenchman overcame the threats with almost routine efficiency, by pouding serves and forehands to Lu's weaker backhand side.

Tsonga is now a solid 20-9 in Grand Slam matches in 2011, with a semifinal finish at Wimbledon in his last major. He also has two wins over Roger Federer in the past three months--one in the quarters at Wimbledon and the other in the round-of-16 in Montreal. A finalist at the 2008 Australian Open, Tsonga's hard-court suited game makes him one of the main challengers here to the big three of Djokovic, Federer and Rafael Nadal.


In his first round match today at the U.S. Open, World No. 84 Donald Young, chalked up a win against Slovak Lukas Lacko, ranked 162nd in the world in straight sets, 6-4, 6-2, 6-4.


Post match Donald was asked about being the first American male to win on the new court, he said " It's awesome.  I didn't know that.  I'm just happy to win the first match and happy to be on that court, which is great. Yeah, I'm happy that's part of history."

When compared to fellow American Mardy Fish in that he seems to be a late bloomer, Donald responded, "Yeah, I mean, I think everyone's light turns on at their own time.  I'm starting to feel like mine is turning on.  Yeah, people do it at their own time.  Not everybody does it when everybody expects it to be done. I wish it could have been earlier.  It's starting to come now and I'm excited about it."

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Top seed Gael Monfils defeated fellow Frenchman Josselin Ouanna 6-4, 7-5 on Thursday in Johannesburg to book his place in the quarter-finals at the SA Tennis Open, an ATP World Tour 250 tennis tournament.

Ouanna managed to save 13 of the 16 break point chances he faced on serve, but it still did not prove enough to prevent his more experienced countryman from closing out the victory in one hour and 21 minutes.

Afterwards, World No. 13 Monfils admitted he had to work for the win against the 88th-ranked Ouanna. “I think he knows me well, and it’s hard all the time when players know you well,” he said. “Also, I just didn’t get the big serve. It was a bit tough. I needed to be focused to get back the return. Also, sometimes he can hit very hard with his forehand, so today was definitely harder than the first game.”

Monfils made an impressive tournament debut Tuesday, taking just 53 minutes to dismiss Slovakian veteran Dominik Hrbaty. The 23 year old is attempting to keep the Johannesburg title in French possession, after Jo-Wilfried Tsonga won the SA Tennis Open last year.

He will look to reach an ATP World Tour semi-final for the second time this season when he next plays seventh seed Yen-Hsun Lu. Earlier in the evening, after a 90-minute rain delay, Lu knocked out South African wild card Raven Klaasen 6-4, 7-5 in one hour and 56 minutes.

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