First-round singles matches completed

The best examples of the fact that tennis fate is sometimes fickle and that predicting the outcomes of the following day is never easy are none other than Andrej Rublev and Kenny De Schepper. The young Russian was eliminated in the qualifiers, while the 30-year-old Frenchman was on the verge of going out facing four match points from our very own Franko Škugor. And yet, they are both still in the tournament.

Rublev benefited from the dropping out of Borna Ćorić and entered the main draw as the lucky loser. And he used that second chance here in Umag to the maximum. The 19-year-old from Moscow easily beat Carlos Berlocq, a solid clay player, in just two sets (6:2, 6:4).

In the French mini derby, Kenny De Schepper surprised Benoit Paire. The seventh seed came back after a lost first set, and made up for the break in third, but could not remain calm enough against the left-handed fellow countryman.