ATP Geneva: Top seed Stan Wawrinka cruises through his opening match to progress to the last eight

Stan Wawrinka was in action on day three at the Geneva Open, and dropped just two games to set up a quarterfinal clash with Pablo Carreno Busta. Defending champion Thomaz Bellucci defeated Mikhail Kukushkin in similarly comfortable fashion, 6-2, 6-1, whilst the second-seeded doubles pairing were knocked out in their first round encounter.

Wawrinka cruises past Ramos-Vinolas

Wawrinka dropped just two games to progress to the last eight (Photo: Getty Images/Matthew Lewis)

World number four Stan Wawrinka began his home tournament by emphatically beating Albert Ramos-Vinolas 6-1, 6-1. The match could have been so different for the Swiss, as he held his serve in the very first game after three deuces. After this slow start, he motored ahead, and secured back-to-back breaks to clinch the opener, losing only seven points on his first delivery.

A similar pattern continued in the second set with Wawrinka breaking the Spaniard’s serve three times, including to secure victory after Ramos-Vinolas had just saved a break point. It was a dominant performance from the Swiss number two, as he only was forced to save one break point throughout, which came deep in the second set when he led 6-1, *4-1. He faces Carreno Busta next in the quarterfinals, and will be desperate to gain some form going into his Roland Garros title defence.

Bellucci wins comfortably to begin his title defence

Bellucci is aiming to retain his 2015 Geneva triumph (Photo: Getty Images/Fabrice Coffrini)

One man who is defending a title this week is Thomaz Bellucci, with the Brazilian attempting to retain the Geneva crown after surprisingly lifting the title in 2015. The Brazilian started his defence in blistering style, recording a one-sided score of 6-2, 6-1 over Mikhail Kukushkin.

The match started tightly, with neither player breaking despite Bellucci having one opportunity in the fourth game. He eventually broke through in the next game, before saving one on his own serve, to win the set by breaking for the second consecutive game. Their meeting was tipped to be a close tie, but the world number 39 had other ideas, and broke again twice in the second set to record the victory, and level the pair’s head-to-head record at 1-1.

Other day three results

Pablo Carreno Busta set up his meeting with Wawrinka by defeating fellow Spaniard Inigo Cervantes 6-2, 6-4, to record his third win over his compatriot in 2016. This was the only other second round clash to take place on day three, with Rajeev Ram beating Evgeny Donskoy 7-6 (5), 4-6, 6-3 and Denis Istomin seeing-off Florian Mayer 6-2, 6-3 in the final first round matches that still required deciding.

All top four seeds in the doubles event played their first round matches today, and three pairs progressed with the second seeds OIiver Marach and Fabrice Martin being dispatched in three sets by Wesley Koolhof and Matwe Middelkoop. The match required a champions tie-breaker which the Dutch pair won 10-8.

Day four preview

David Ferrer starts his Geneva campaign tomorrow (Photo: Getty Images/Giuseppe Bellini)

Bellucci continues his defence in Geneva against last year’s semifinalist Federico Delbonis, in the second match scheduled for Court Central on day four. The pair have met six times previously, with the Argentine interestingly holding a positive 4-2 record. All six meetings have taken place on clay. Second seed David Ferrer takes on Istomin in the only singles match of the evening session, whilst other seeds Marin Cilic and John Isner take on Ernests Gulbis and Lukas Rosol respectively.

There is also action on Court One, where seventh seed Steve Johnson looks to back up his win over Mikhail Youzhny, as he takes on Andrey Kuznetsov. Guillermo Garcia-Lopez faces Ram in the next match on the court, with two doubles match concluding the day four schedule.