Second seed Bernard Tomic was in action on day three at the Ricoh Open and advanced in straight sets. Nicolas Mahut also continued his defence with a second-round win. Fifth seed Sam Querrey and wild card Stefan Kozlov also advanced to the quarterfinals defeating fellow American and fourth seed Steve Johnson as second round matches got underway.
Defending champion through to quarterfinals
Nico Mahut, who tends to play well here at s-Hertogenbosch having won the title for the second time last year, progressed to the quarterfinals following a three-set victory over compatriot Paul-Henri Mathieu, stopping a two-match losing streak. It was the Mahut who got off to the better start by breaking Mathieu in the fourth game. The remainder of the set went on serve and Mahut claimed the first set. The second set, however, was dominated by Mathieu and following breaks in the second and fourth games, it was the man from Strasbourg who leveled by taking the second set 6-1. The start of the third was tight, but in the eighth game, Mahut broke and from then on in he closed out the victory.
Second-seed Tomic advances
The first set started tight and having saved a break point in the ninth game, Tomic broke at the second attempted and grabbed the first set.The momentum continued into the second set and he pushed Aljaz Bedene, who was forced to save two break points in the third game. There were three consecutive breaks of serve towards the end of the match with the Australian breaking in the sixth game, only to be broken back straight away before breaking for the second time and going on to hold serve.
Fifth-seed Querrey through
Sam Querrey was one of two Americans in action and he got off to a winning start against Tatsuma Ito. Querrey immediately hit the ground running and got the only break of the opening set en route to victory. There was again only one break of the serve in the second set, this time coming towards the end of the set at 4-3. The 28-year-old served out the match and continued his strong start.
Kozlov sends fourth seed packing
Stefan Kozlov made the most of the wildcard opportunity and scored a win against fourth seed Steve Johnson 6-3, 6-4. The 18-year-old battled to break Johnson on his fifth opportunity in the longest game of the match. He managed to consolidate and go 3-1 up. In the upcoming game, he did have to erase a break point, but managed to hold and impressive on serve. With the set coming to an end, Johnson had a further two break points fended off and Kozlov in the next game served it out at the first time of asking. The teenager got the first break of the set in the second game, but immediately gifted the break back to Johnson, who then leveled at 2-2. The sixth game would see the youngster break again and this time he managed to hold serve and go 5-2 up. A couple of games later and Johnson would need a fifth break point before converting. However, Kozlov managed to break back which sealed victory. He will face another fellow American in Querrey, who came through earlier.