Dan Evans beats Dustin Brown but Stan Wawrinka knocked out at Dubai Tennis Championships
Tuesday 28 February 2017 14:26, UK
Dan Evans cruised into the second round of the Dubai Tennis Championships but defending champion Stan Wawrinka was beaten by Damir Dzumhur.
Evans, who hasn't played since Great Britain's Davis Cup victory over Canada last month, had little trouble against the world No 81, losing just five games and facing no break points.
The British No 3 came through 6-2 6-3 in just 51 minutes to set up a second round meeting with world No 12 Gael Monfils who beat Egyptian wild card Mohamed Safwat.
However there was a huge shock as defending champion and second seed Wawrinka crashed out in the opening round to Bosnia and Herzegovina's Dzumhur.
The three-time Grand Slam champion was making his return from a knee injury but could not get any rhythm going and as he lost 7-6 6-3 to the world No 77.
Wawrinka had not played any tournament tennis since the Australian Open, where he lost to Swiss compatriot and eventual champion Roger Federer in the semi-finals.
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He had been due to compete in Rotterdam in February but pulled out because of the knee injury he started feeling in Melbourne.
Wawrinka broke Dzumhur's serve in the second game of the match but he was pegged back to 4-4 and the opening set had to be decided by a tie-break, where just a single mini-break was enough for Dzumhur, ranked 77 in the world, to move into the lead.
That setback affected Wawrinka in the early stages of the second set as he dropped his service twice to trail 5-1, with Dzumhur serving for the match.
The world No 3 was able to break back and hold his own serve, but Dzumhur took his second chance to serve for the match and set up a second-round date with Spain's Marcel Granollers.
Spain's Fernando Verdasco was an early winner, beating Andreas Seppi 6-2 7-5 after the Italian took a lucky loser's spot following the withdrawal of Florian Mayer.
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