2011 Movistar Open, Pablo Andujar clashes with Italian Potito Starace, preview
The ATP Tour saw its first red clay event of the season as the 2011 Movistar Open kicked off this week. An ATP 250 level event, the tournament enters its fourth day of play on Thursday with a wrap up of the second round clashes
While Colombian Santiago Giraldo and Russian Igor Andreev battle it out in Cancha Central, Spaniard Pablo Andujar clashes with Italian Potito Starace on Cancha 14.
Ranked 48th in the world, Starace is seeded fifth in the event. Playing at his second ATP Tour event for the season, Starace started his 2011 run playing at the Medibank International in Sydney.
Un-seeded in the event, Starace enjoyed three set wins over Julien Benneteau and lucky loser, Lukasz Kubot before being ousted from the event by Florian Mayer in straight sets. Struck with bad luck of being drawn against fourth seed, Robin Soderling, Starace
was ousted from the Australian Open.
Starace debuted at the event in 2005 though he did not next appear in Santiago till 2009. His career best at the event came in 2009 when he made it to the second round otherwise the Italian failed to make it past the first round in 2005 and 2010.
Playing against a crowd favourite at Santiago in his opening clash here, Starace bounced back from being one set down before doing away with local wildcard entrant Paul Capdeville.
Andujar on the other hand had a smoother run into the second round as he defeated the Aussie Peter Luczak in twin set scores of 6-4, 6-4. Coming from a first round exit at the Australian Open at the hands of Xavier Malisse, Andujar is playing his first tour
level event of the season.
Having appeared once before in 2009, Andujar failed to make it past the first round losing to then wildcard entrant, Juan Ignacio Chela.
His clash with Starace is the pair’s second meeting on the tour with the head to head score resting at 1-0 in the Italian’s favour. Their last meeting had come in the 2007 Valencia Open 500 where Starace had secured a three set win over the Spaniard despite
the latter’s home crowd advantage. Starace also enjoys a 3-0 lead against the pair in their three meetings on the Challenger tour.
Prediction: Enjoying the higher ranking plus the statistical c*m psychological edge of having defeated Andujar, Starace will probably emerge as the victor and clinch a spot for himself in the quarterfinals.
Also battling it out for a spot in the quarterfinals will be Brazilian qualifier Caio Zampieri as he takes on fourth seeded Argentine, Chela.
Chela started 2011 playing at the Sydney even though he failed to make it past the second round owing to his loss to eventual finalist, Viktor Troicki. He met with another early round exit in the Grand Slam when he was ousted by twenty second seed, Michael
Llodra.
Playing for his seventh year here, Chela has never made it past the quarterfinal round, which came in 2009. A wildcard in the event then, Chela exited the event after his loss to Tommy Robredo. Determined to make it one step further at least this time, Chela
started his run at the event playing local qualifier, Jorge Aguilar enjoying a straight sets victory over him.
Zampieri on the other hand is playing at only his second ATP Tour level event, his first being the Brasil Open at Costa Do Sauipe in 2010. A qualifier in the event, Zampieri is the only one of the four that survives into the second round. Pitted against
local wildcard entrant, Nicolas Massu, Zampieri enjoyed a straight, yet not so simple sets victory over him.
Though Zampieri and Chela have never played each other on tour, they do have one meeting in the records on the Challenger Tour with Chela emerging as the victor.
Prediction: Given the fact that Chela outranks Zampieri by almost 300 places in the world ranking, the Argentine is clearly the favourite to win the match and make it into the quarterfinals.
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