Marcos Baghdatis produced an impressive display of claycourt tennis to sweep aside former French Open winner Carlos Moya 6-2, 6-3 in the first round of the Rome Masters on Tuesday.
The 21-year-old Cypriot, who reached the semi-finals of last week's claycourt event in Barcelona, unleashed a barrage of powerful, angled groundstrokes to race through the first set and go a break up early in the second.
Having held off five break points in the eighth game, he then broke Moya again to close out the contest in just over an hour.
Baghdatis will next play Radek Stepanek of the Czech Republic, who progressed when his opponent, 11th seed Tommy Haas, retired at 6-3, 3-2 down with a right shoulder injury.
Stepanek's compatriot, 12th seed Tomas Berdych, also advanced to the second round with a 6-4, 7-5 win over Jarkko Nieminen of Finland.
Former world number one Marat Safin set up an all-Russian second-round showdown against fourth seed Nikolay Davydenko with a 2-6, 6-3, 6-4 victory over American qualifier Amer Delic.
First round results:
Marat Safin (Russia) beat Amer Delic (U.S.) 2-6, 6-3, 6-4
Radek Stepanek (Czech Republic) beat 11-Tommy Haas (Germany) 6-3, 3-2 (Haas retired)
12-Tomas Berdych (Czech Republic) beat Jarkko Nieminen (Finland) 6-4, 7-5
Marcos Baghdatis (Cyprus) beat Carlos Moya (Spain) 6-2, 6-3
Potito Starace (Italy) beat Agustin Calleri (Argentina) 6-3, 6-1
Guillermo Canas (Argentina) beat Juergen Melzer (Austria) 7-5, 6-2
Robin Soederling (Sweden) beat Benjamin Becker (Germany) 6-3, 6-3
Gilles Simon (France) beat 10-Andy Murray (Britain) 6-1, 1-6, 6-3
Oscar Hernandez (Spain) beat Lleyton Hewitt (Australia) 3-6,7-6(3), 6-1
Jose Acasuso (Argentina) beat Martin Verkerk (Netherlands) 6-3, 7-5
Dmitry Tursunov (Russia) beat Jonas Bjorkman (Sweden) 7-6(10), 3-6, 6-1
16-Juan Carlos Ferrero (Spain) beat Dominik Hrbaty (Slovakia) 3-6, 6-1, 6-4
Nicolas Almagro (Spain) beat Tim Henman (Britain) 7-5, 6-1
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