Enqvist Makes Winning Debut; Rios Stunned by Wild Card

Thomas Enqvist made the perfect start to his career on the ATP Champions Tour on Thursday with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Sergi Bruguera in the AOC Grand Champions event in Sao Paulo, Brazil, but Marcelo Rios suffered a shock defeat 6-0, 6-3 at the hands of Israeli wildcard Gilad Bloom. Playing in his first event since retiring from professional tennis in 2006, Enqvist faced a tough proposition against the 2007 Sao Paulo Champion Bruguera, and the Swede had to produce some of his trademark, laser-like hitting from the baseline to come through in straight sets.

“It was a lot of fun to be out on the court again and to see all these guys again that I’ve shared a lot of memories with.” said Enqvist. “Being with them in this kind of environment where it’s a little more relaxed is a lot of fun. I felt like we both played pretty well tonight and I think that the quality of tennis was pretty good. It’s difficult when you don’t play so often because you don’t have as much consistency, but if I keep playing like this I think I will enjoy myself in every way.”

Against Bloom, Rios looked out-of-sorts throughout the straight-sets drubbing, but Bloom’s efforts should not go unnoticed. The Israeli played a clever match, approaching the net at every opportunity and mixing up his play effectively, never allowing Rios the rhythm on which he thrives.
“I’m very happy to win,” said Bloom. “I’m in good shape and I’m always fighting so if I catch a guy on a bad day I can always get a win. I had a game plan which was to keep the points short, to come in and play drop shots and slices and just to try and throw him off. It worked better than I expected to be honest.”

Thursday’s win over Rios means that Bloom now tops Group A, a position he admits he wans’t expecting to be in coming in to the event. “I’m a little bit overwhelmed by those big names surrounding me,” he said. “Getting a win here is a bonus for me and if I can make it to Sunday then that would be a great effort.”

In the day’s other matches, Paul Haarhuis played imperious serve-and-volley tennis to down Emilio Sanchez 7-6(2), 6-0 and draw level with Enqvist at the top of Group B. In the second Group A match, home favourite Fernando Meligeni defeated Frenchman Henri Leconte 6-4, 6-2 to join Bloom at the top of the Group.

Matches are played over the best of three sets, with a Champions’ Tie-break (first to 10 points with a clear advantage of two) to decide the winner. After all round-robin matches are complete, the top two players in each group will meet in Sunday's final.

After Sao Paulo, the ATP Champions Tour will move on to Graz for the s Tennis Masters (August 5-9), and later will arrive in the Algarve for the Vale Do Lobo Grand Champions CGD (August 11-14).