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SHANGHAI - Roger Federer outfoxed defending champion David Nalbandian 3-6 6-1 6-1 in the opening match of the Masters Cup last night, avenging his loss to the Argentine in last year's final.
And American Andy Roddick, serving 20 aces, beat an error-prone Ivan Ljubicic 6-4 6-7 6-1 to
win the day's other clash after failing to capitalise on two match points in the second-set tiebreak.
Nalbandian, the world number seven, bludgeoned world number one Federer in the first set with deep, powerful groundstrokes that skidded on the indoor surface of the futuristic Qi Zhong stadium.
The Argentine won the first of his three service breaks during the set with two consecutive groundstroke winners to the corners.
But Federer changed the rhythm of the game from the second set, bringing Nalbandian close to the net and passing him.
The rattled Argentine started to make errors and after breaking serve in the first game of the second set, Federer dominated. Nalbandian lost a chance to break back in the second set by missing an easy return.
"I had to make him hit some errors -- he wasn't doing that at the beginning," Federer said.
"A couple of years ago I wouldn't have known what to do," the world number one told reporters, adding that experience had taught him how to handle "an incredibly good baseliner" like Nalbandian.
The Swiss player won seven of his eight points at the net but Nalbandian, frequently at full stretch, won just eight of 16.
Nalbandian blamed a weak first serve for his loss but said of Federer: "He has all the shots. I mean, he can make any shot from anywhere."
Nalbandian clawed his way back from two sets down to beat an injury-hit Federer in last year's final of the Shanghai Masters but Federer has now won eight of their last nine meetings.
Roddick's big serve helped him against Ljubicic but it was the Croatian's mistakes that were the decisive factor -- Ljubicic sprayed groundstrokes past the baseline, making 35 unforced errors compared to Roddick's 22.
The Croat said afterwards he felt slow and weak after not practicing for three weeks because of an allergy.
After failing to close out the second-set tiebreak, Roddick never looked in danger in the third set, winning the fifth match point of the game by wrongfooting Ljubicic with a backhand volley.
"I didn't want him to get comfortable trying to block the returns back in the court and get back into baseline rallies. I felt like I took that aspect of his game away today with the serve-and-volley play," Roddick said.
The US$3.7 million, round-robin Masters Cup pits the world's eight top-ranked players against each other.
In the other singles group, world number two Rafael Nadal will play James Blake and Tommy Robredo will play Nikolay Davydenko later today.
- REUTERS