Gael Monfils needed one hour, five minutes to overcome Uruguayan Pablo Cuevas, 6-1, 6-4 in the first round of the Argentina Open in Buenos Aires on Tuesday.

Monfils won 75 per cent of his first serve points, and converted on his two break point opportunities. 

With the win, Monfils moved to 4-1 in his FedEx ATP Head2Head series against Cuevas. The No. 43-ranked Frenchman will play Dusan Lajovic in the next round. Lajovic was a 7-6(4), 6-1 winner over Argentine qualifier Facundo Bagnis on Monday.

Fifth seed Diego Schwartzman, the highest-seeded Argentine in the singles draw, broke five times to beat Andreas Haider-Maurer of Austria. Schwartzman is attempting to become the first homegrown champion in Buenos Aires since David Nalbandian in 2008.

Earlier on Tuesday, eighth-seeded Fernando Verdasco moved past Brazil’s Thiago Monteiro, 6-2, 7-5. Verdasco will face Guido Pella, a 2-6, 6-4, 6-4 winner over Nicolas Kicker, in the second round.

Adrian Menendez-Maceiras entered the inaugural New York Open having played just 15 tour-level matches at the age of 32. That is less than two per cent of matches in his career. 

But New York has been a successful location for the Spaniard, who claimed his first Grand Slam match victory last year at Flushing Meadows. And on Tuesday, Menendez-Maceiras saved five match points against home favourite Steve Johnson, the No. 7 seed, to claim his fourth tour-level win. After the match, he spoke to ATPWorldTour.com about his passions and his future.

What’s your biggest passion outside of tennis and why?
Many things but many that I cannot do, because I like risky sports. It’s difficult because I’m a professional player and I can’t ski or go to the mountains and climb, these things. But maybe when I finish my career.

What was the last book you read?
I read novels a lot and biographies about sportsmen and motivational books, I like them.

What is your favourite book?
One of my favourite biographies was about one of my idols when I was young, Andre Agassi. He was a great player from the baseline and I love his game so I liked his book.

Last concert or show you attended?
I don’t have time to go to concerts. One of my dreams for these two months, with my physio, we like Above and Beyond a lot and I know they’re coming over to the United States. But I don’t know if I’ll have time to go and see them.

Favourite sport to watch besides tennis?
I like football a lot. Soccer. I follow it a lot. I have family in Madrid and sometimes I have time to go there to see the Champions League and I enjoy it a lot.

Favourite Club?
Real Madrid.

Outside of your family, whom do you admire most?
My coach in Marbella, Eric Scherer. He’s not here unfortunately but I’m working with him a lot. He’s my age. He’s a great friend and I think we’re working a lot to have a match like today. I was fighting a lot and working a lot for many years with him and finally I got it.

My tennis career will be a success if ___________
Last year I got my first win at a Grand Slam here in the US Open. For me it was unbelievable, so many years and finally to get a win in a big event. For sure now it’s fighting to get into the Top 100 [of the ATP Rankings].

After my tennis career, I want to ___________
I love kids and I love my sport so that’s why I’m still fighting, playing here and travelling so much away from my family and my girlfriend. I love my sport and for sure in the future I want to teach the kids.

David Goffin got his 2018 ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament campaign off to a great start on Tuesday, beating France’s Nicolas Mahut 6-1, 6-3 in 64 minutes.

Last year’s runner-up charged through the first set, breaking his opponent twice while dropping just five points on his own serve. The Frenchman, who replaced compatriot Benoit Paire in the draw, started the second set in great fashion, with break points to lead 2-0, but Goffin battled his way out of trouble and eventually re-asserted his authority to reach the last 16.

Goffin, who served seven aces in eight service games, will meet Spain’s Feliciano Lopez for a place in the quarter-finals. Lopez recorded just his second win in nine visits to Rotterdam on Monday, beating 2016 champion Martin Klizan 6-3, 7-6(4).

In a battle of recent Sydney International champions, 2018 champion Daniil Medvedev upset 2017 winner Gilles Muller 6-4, 7-6(9) in exactly two hours to advance to the second round. The 22-year-old Russian hit 12 aces to upset the ninth seed and will meet the winner of the all-French first-round match between Richard Gasquet and Pierre-Hugues Herbert.

Philipp Kohlschreiber began action on centre court with an impressive come-from-behind 3-6, 7-6(1), 7-6(5) win over Karen Khachanov. Winless in 2018 heading into Rotterdam, the German 34-year-old won 104 points to the Russian’s 105 but held firm in the crucial moments to set up a second-round meeting against top seed Roger Federer or qualifier Ruben Bemelmans.

Did You Know?
David Goffin entered the 2017 ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament, where he reached the final (l. to Tsonga), with an 0-3 record.

Jean-Julien Rojer and Horia Tecau began their campaign for a second title at the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament in Rotterdam with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Feliciano Lopez and Marc Lopez on Tuesday

The 2015 champions converted all three break point opportunities they created against the Spaniards, with a 74 per cent success rate on serve. The Dutch-Romanian duo await the winners of the Centre Court match as Robin Haase and Matwe Middelkoop face fellow Dutch wild card pairing Jasper Smit and Jesse Timmermans.

Oliver Marach and Mate Pavic survived a huge first-round test to beat local favourites Sander Arends and Thiemo De Bakker 6-4, 1-6, 11-9. Undefeated in 2018 with three tournament wins, the second seeds were taken all the way by the Dutch qualifiers, but proved their strength to win their fourth Match Tie-break of the year. Marach and Pavic will next meet Damir Dzumhur and Filip Krajinovic for a place in the semi-finals.

Did You Know?
Marach and Pavic’s three previous Match Tie-break wins in 2018 all came en route to winning the ASB Classic in Auckland.

Ryan Harrison’s start to remember in 2018 continued on Monday at the New York Open. The Louisiana native outplayed compatriot Donald Young 6-3, 7-6(4) to advance to the second round in Long Island.

This is the first ATP World Tour tournament on Long Island since 2004 when the tennis took place in August, one week before the US Open. This year’s tournament is being played at the NYCB Live, home of the Nassau Coliseum. Harrison won the 2017 Memphis Open, the former name of this ATP World Tour tournament (d. Basilashvili).

“A tricky match… I was serving well early and that was able to get me through a lot of early mistakes and missed opportunities with some early break points,” he said.

Harrison improved to 7-2 on the year. He reached the final at the Sydney International (l. to Kyrgios) and the third round at the Australian Open (l. to Cilic). Harrison will next meet Croatian Ivo Karlovic, who hit 20 aces to prevail past Harrison’s countryman Jared Donaldson 6-4, 7-6(4).  “I started well. That helped me at the beginning of the match because I knew I could do well against him,” Karlovic said.

#NextGenATP compatriot Frances Tiafoe celebrated his first tour-level win of the season, beating junior World No. 1 Sebastian Korda, the son of 1998 Australian Open champion Petr Korda, 4-6, 6-4, 6-2. Petr Korda also won the Hamlet Cup in Long Island in 1992 for one of his 10 singles titles.

Tiafoe, a favourite to make the 2018 Next Gen ATP Finals in Milan, fell in the first round at the Brisbane International presented by Suncorp and the Australian Open. Sebastian Korda, 17, was making his tour-level debut. The 6’4” right-hander won the Australian Open boys’ singles title last month to rise to No. 1 in the junior rankings.

“He’s playing great tennis. I congratulate him on winning the Australian Open. He’s going to have a great career,” Tiafoe said.

Tiafoe will next face Israeli Dudi Sela, who beat eighth seed Nikoloz Basilashvili, 6-4, 6-4.

Neal Skupski has started his 2018 much like he finished 2017. At the end of last season, he teamed with brother Ken Skupski to make the ATP Challenger Tour final in Eckental, Germany, and triumph in Bratislava, Slovakia. The brothers then captured the trophy two weeks ago at another Challenger in Quimper, France. But this past week, Neal achieved his greatest result to date, joining Ken again to win his first tour-level title at the Open Sud de France in Montpellier.

Skupski spoke to ATPWorldTour.com upon his arrival at the New York Open, where he is competing alongside 91-time tour-level titlist Daniel Nestor.

How does it feel to be an ATP World Tour champion?
It’s unbelievable. It’s obviously a dream come true to win an ATP event with your brother. Ken’s won three before, but never with me. We came very close four years ago in Moscow. We had match points… it’s nice to finally get over the line and hopefully win a few more together before the year ends.

Beating the second seeds in your opener and the fourth seeds in the final, how incredible was the whole week for you?
Going into it, I think we were one of the last teams to get into the tournament. Playing against the No. 2 seeds you have nothing to lose, really. We go into that match, we come out on top and take a lot of confidence from that and just took the momentum from round to round.

Did your brother say anything to you before match point?
Yeah, I think he did but I can’t quite remember. The last game went by pretty quickly. I held to love, all four first serves in. I couldn’t have asked for a better game, really. I was pretty nervous about it but once we got over the line there was a lot of hugging going on. My brother and I were pretty happy.

What were the first comments he made after you won?
He did say he was very proud of me, but obviously it was a team effort. It was our first time winning a title, he was proud of that. It was great for the whole family. We worked really hard to get to this point. But hopefully this is just the first one, hopefully there are more to come.

Making the quarter-finals at Wimbledon was special to you. How does this achievement compare?
It’s very difficult. Obviously playing at Wimbledon is very special, it’s your home Grand Slam. We beat some great teams on the way there. You go into the Grand Slam thinking to win a couple rounds. But to make the quarter-finals was incredible. Ever since that we’ve gained a lot of confidence. Toward the end of the year we changed sides. I’m on the ad side, Ken’s on the deuce side now. That’s done really well. Our first tournament we made the final of Eckental, Germany. Won Bratislava, then Quimper and now we’ve won Montpellier. So it’s gone well so far on these sides.

This week you’re playing with a 91-time tour-level champion, Daniel Nestor for the first time. How exciting is that to you?
He’s a lefty, which is going to help a little bit. I’m going to be listening to him the whole week. He’s definitely got a lot of things to tell me, hopefully not too much (laughs). But it’s going to be an honour to play with Daniel this week. It’s nice to play with him before he finishes. But yeah, hopefully we could get some good practices in before we start.