Somdev crashes out of French Open singles

India's Somdev Devvarman crashed out of the men's singles at the French Open after suffering a 4-6, 3-6, 4-6 first round defeat to world No 37 Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia, in Paris, on Tuesday.

The big-serving Croat took little over two hours to quell the challenge of the top-ranked Indian.

It was always going to be a tough match for Somdev, who doesn't fancy playing on clay courts.

Ljubicic, who is a known clay-court specialist, fired 10 aces against four by the Indian.

It was Somdev's second serve that let him down. While Ljubicic got 70 percent of his second serves in, Somdev's success with the second serve was a mere 47 percent.

Not only did the Croat have superior baseline game, but time and again he created pressure on the 66-ranked Indian with his timely net approaches.

That was precisely the reason that Ljubicic hit as many as 40 winners.

Somdev's only break point conversion came in the first set when he got four chances to break his opponent.

Ljubicic converted both the break-points to wrap the first set.

Somdev couldn't put up much resistance in the second set, which he lost in only 29 minutes.

He tried to put up a fight in the third set, but Ljubicic hardly broke a sweat before moving to the next round.

On Monday, Sania Mirza started her campaign with an impressive 6-3, 6-3 victory over Kristina Barrois in the first round of the women's singles.