The time has come for Andy Roddick to retire before he loses his past glory.

Andy Roddick was unceremoniously dumped out of the Regions Morgan Keegan Championships in the first round by Xavier Malisse. The Belgian upset the second seed as he prevailed 7-6 (10-8) 7-5 to set up a second-round clash with Benjamin Becker. The German beat Dudi Sela 6-4 6-1. Alex Bogomolov Jr was another seed eliminated in Memphis when he was beaten 1-6 6-4 7-6 (7-5) by Malisse’s fellow Belgian Olivier Rochus, while sixth-seed Julian Benneteau was beaten in successive tie-breaks by Philipp Petzschner. But there were straight-sets wins for Radek Stepanek, Milos Raonic and Kevin Anderson – the third, fourth and seventh seeds – against Bobby Reynolds, Ernests Gulbis and Robby Ginepri respectively. Jurgen Melzer won a hard-fought match against Denis Istomin 6-7 (2-7) 6-3 7-6 (7-4) and Pole Lukasz Kubot beat Jesse Levine 7-6 (7-2) 6-4.

Young Tomic is thru to the quarters….Djokovic next?

Australian teenage sensation Bernard Tomic sprinted through to the quarter-finals of Wimbledon with a crushing win over Xavier Malisse on Court 18. The 18-year-old qualifier from the Gold Coast, who knocked out fifth seed Robin Soderling in straight sets on Saturday, added another chapter to his fairytale story as he dispatched his more fancied opponent 6-1 7-5 6-4 in just an hour and 21 minutes. The win extends his best run at a grand slam event to give him a last-eight berth, although his quarter-final opponent, one of Michael Llodra or Novak Djokovic, is sure to test him more than out-of-sorts Belgian Malisse, who paid the price for an ill-disciplined start. Malisse was broken in just the second game of the opening set, Tomic hitting a forehand winner, and, when he lost his serve again in the fourth, he set about exchanging words with the umpire.

He was unhappy with the stringing on his rackets, even going as far as suggesting they had been strung by an Australian, while he also took issue with a number of line calls made on both his and Tomic’s serve.

 

“I wasn’t planning playing doubles here, and here we are, winning the tournament. So it’s pretty amazing.”

The first-time pairing of Alexandr Dolgopolov and Xavier Malisse completed their giant-killing run at the BNP Paribas Open, defeating Olympic gold medalists Roger Federer and Stanislas Wawrinka 6-4, 6-7(5) 10-7 in the doubles final at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament. Dolgopolov said about their unlikely road to the title, “We just said hi before this tournament, and we weren’t like really close. He just asked me, ‘Do you want to play?’ like 15 minutes to the deadline of the doubles because I wasn’t planning playing doubles here and here we are, winning the tournament. So it’s pretty amazing.”

Over the tournament fortnight, the Ukrainian-Belgian pairing ousted top seeds Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan, US Open doubles finalists Rohan Bopanna and Aisam-Ul-Haq Qureshi, and three Top 10 singles players in Federer, Andy Murray (w/J. Murray) and Tomas Berdych (w/Tipsarevic). Their five wins all came in a Match Tie-break. “For sure we were doing that the whole tournament, so I wasn’t really nervous in the final,” Dolgopolov said of playing the Match Tie-break. “We had a lot of luck throughout the tournament. You don’t want to lose it because you’re nervous or something. You get lucky, you win; if not, you lose. We just went for it and got a bit of luck as well in the final.”

It was the first title for the 22-year-old Dolgopolov and the fifth doubles title for the 30-year-old Malisse, whose biggest win came seven years ago at Roland Garros with Olivier Rochus. “I think we just go out there and have fun,” said Malisse of their success. “That’s the main reason. That’s what we said in the beginning. And we return really well, so we make the other guys play all the time. At the net we can manage, and I think we serve well. Those are the things that you need in doubles, I guess. Especially the return, which is every time second serve we make them play and it makes a big difference.”

 

Cilic advances but Ljubicic is ousted by the X-man!

Ivan Ljubicic suffered a shock defeat to Xavier Malisse in round two of the Open de Moselle in Metz.

The third seed was routed 7-5 6-2 inside 80 minutes despite raining down 12 aces on his Belgian opponent. Ljubicic made just 50% of first serves and was broken three times as he became the notable scalp of the day.

Top seed Marin Cilic had no such problems, dispatching Lukas Lacko in straight sets – although both were closely-fought affairs.

A late break, the only one of the match, earned Ljubicic’s compatriot the first set and he prevailed in a second-set tie-break to round out at 7-5 7-6 (7/3) win.

Eighth seed Gilles Simon also advanced after beating Holland’s Igor Sijsling in three sets.

The Frenchman powered through the opener and, though Sijsling held his nerve in a second-set tie-break to delay the inevitable, he completed a 6-1 6-7 (5/7) 6-3 win in an hour and 53 minutes.

In the day’s other matches, Jarkko Nieminen beat Kristof Vliegen 6-4 6-1 and Mischa Zverev saw off Nicolas Mahut 6-4 6-2.

Nalbandian, Berdych advance while Cilic, Baghdatis are ousted.

David Nalbandian kept up his impressive run of form with a three-set win over 10th seed David Ferrer at the Rogers Cup in Toronto.

Nalbandian came through 7-5 3-6 6-3 to reach round two and extend his winning streak to seven matches.

The former world number three won his first title for 20 months in Washington on Sunday following injury problems.

Roger Federer returns to action for the first time since Wimbledon against Juan Ignacio Chela later on Tuesday.

In earlier matches, Belgian Xavier Malisse beat Michael Berrer of Germany 7-6 (7-2) 6-2 to set up a second-round clash with Andy Murray.

The Briton received a first-round bye as one of the top eight seeds.

Wimbledon finalist Tomas Berdych beat Sergiy Stakhovsky 6-2 6-4, while 11th seed Marin Cilic fell 6-4 7-6 (7-2) to Serbia’s Viktor Troicki.

Marcos Baghdatis, who lost to Nalbandian in Sunday’s Washington final, made an early exit with a 7-5 2-6 7-6 (7-4)defeat by France’s Jeremy Chardy.

Baghdatis awaits the winner of the Cilic/Nalbandian match.

Marcos Baghdatis is back up to 25th and will keep climbing thanks to his showing in Washington.

I worked on my fitness. I had to improve my physical condition, stay out of injuries… I worked very hard,” he said.

“I’m fit now, I’m healthy, and that’s the most important thing.”

He has reached the final of the Legg Mason Classic in Washington with a 6-2 7-6 win over Xavier Malisse.

The Cypriot eighth seed lost his serve only once and capitalised on numerous unforced errors by Malisse to reach his first final in the United States.

Baghdatis is chasing his second ATP title of the year, having won the Sydney International back in January.

He will either fourth seed Marin Cilic of Croatia or David Nalbandian of Argentina in Sunday’s final.

After easing through the first set, Baghdatis found Malisse, who beat top seed Tomas Berdych in the quarter-finals, a tougher proposition in the second.

It took the Cypriot until the 11th game to break him again, as Malisse punched a forehand wide to give the 25th-ranked Baghdatis a 6-5 lead.

But Malisse came through when it mattered, breaking Baghdatis in the next game to force a tiebreaker.

The Cypriot raced to a 6-1 lead in the tiebreaker and won it 7-4 when Malisse netted a backhand.

Once as high as eighth in the world rankings, former Australian Open finalist Baghdatis fell out of the top 100 after a series of injuries.

Unlikely final four set in D.C. semis.

The upsets continued at the Legg Mason Tennis Classic in Washington on Friday as top seed Tomas Berdych and Fernando Verdasco were bundled out of the tournament.

Belgian Xavier Malisse recorded a 6-4 3-6 6-2 quarter-final win in two hours 10 minutes over Berdych, who joined second seed Andy Roddick in exiting the tournament.

Third seed Verdasco was also ousted, losing 7-6 (7/3) 6-4 to Marco Baghdatis, the eighth seed.

Even Bob and Mike Bryan lost in the second round of the doubles!

Less than a week after winning their record 62nd ATP doubles title, the second-seeded Bryans were beaten 7-6 (6), 7-5 Friday by the unseeded pair of Rohan Bopanna of India and Aisam-ul-Haq Qureshi of Pakistan.

Baghdatis and Malisse will meet in the last four.

The second semi-final will be between David Nalbandian and Marin Cilic.

Nalbandian defeated 13th seed Gilles Simon – the conqueror of second seed Roddick – 3-6 6-2 6-3.

Cilic claimed a 7-6 (7/4) 6-4 win over Janko Tipsarevic in a match which saw a solitary break of serve.

Clijster getting ready to return for the grass court season.

Kim Clijsters and Xavier Malisse will team up for the mixed doubles at this month’s 2010 Wimbledon.

It is not the first time Kim and Xavier play together. From 2002 to 2004 they represented Belgium in the Hopman Cup.

Currently Kim is recovering from a foot injury. During the Fed Cup duel against Estonia end of April she injured her left foot and had to cancel the French Open. She will return to the courts at the Eastbourne tournament, which starts 14 June. There Kim will also take part in the women’s doubles, along with the Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova.

In the men’s doubles Malisse has already won one Grand Slam. In 2004 he won the French Open, together with Olivier Rochus.

X man downs Stepanek in San Jose.

Defending champion Radek Stepanek became the first defending champion in two decades to lose in the first round of the SAP Open, falling 6-3, 6-4 to Xavier Malisse on Wednesday.

The third-seeded Stepanek was broken once in each set to become the first defending champion to lose his first match the following year at this tournament since Brad Gilbert was knocked out by Gary Muller in 1990. Stepanek beat Mardy Fish for the title last year in San Jose after losing the championship the previous year to Andy Roddick.

 Stepanek wasn’t the only seeded player to fall Wednesday. Fourth-seeded Tommy Haas lost his second-round match to Denis Istomin 7-6 (3), 6-2. Haas had five set points on Istomin’s serve in the first set before falling in the tiebreaker. He double-faulted on break point in his first service game of the second set and then was broken at love to lose the match.

In other second-round matches Wednesday, Philipp Kohlschreiber beat Dudi Sela 6-2, 6-0, and Tomas Berdych beat Jarkko Nieminen 6-3, 6-2.

In the featured night matches, top-seeded Roddick was set to take on Ryler DeHeart, and second-seeded Fernando Verdasco faced Yen-Hsun Lu in first-round matches.