The 2013 champion Andy Murray made short work of fellow Brit Liam Broady as he got his 2016 campaign off to a flying start with a 6-2, 6-3, 6-4 win in one hour forty two minutes on Tuesday on Center Court. The proceedings on Day 2, which is traditionally known as Ladies Day, were started by the defending champion Serena Williams who was a 6-2, 6-4 winner over Amra Sadikovic of Switzerland. Williams is looking for her 22nd career grand slam which would tie Steffi Graf’s record.

Two time major winner Stanislas Wawrinka took four sets to tame the 18 year old American Taylor Fritz 7-6(4), 6-1, 6-7(2), 6-4. He will next take on the 2009 U.S. Open champion Juan Martin Del Potro of Argentina who beat Frenchman Stephane Robert 6-1, 7-5, 6-0. Last year’s semi finalist Richard Gasquet prevailed 6-3, 6-4, 6-3 over the Slovenia born Aljaz Bedene.

Other seeded players advancing on a rain shortened day 2 were the 12th seeded Frenchman Jo Wilfred Tsonga 6-4, 7-6(5), 6-4. The 15th seeded Nick Kyrgios of Australia was a 6-4, 6-3, 6-7(9), 6-1 win over the Czech veteran Radek Stepanek. Joao Sousa of Portugal edged out the Russian Dmitry Tursunov in five sets. Spaniards Feliciano Lopez and Roberto Bautista Agut, Victor Troicki of Serbia were straight set winners advancing into round two.

The 26th seeded Frenchman Benoit Paire prevailed 10-8 in the fifth set against Croatia’s Franko Skugor, while Giles Muller of Luxembourg erased a two set deficit to win 4-6, 6-7(3), 7-6(5), 6-3, 15-13 against the Colombian Santiago Giraldo in a match lasting 4 hours and 15 minutes.

The unseeded players to advance were Marcel Granollers, Juan Monaco, Mikhail Kukushkin, Yen Hsun Lu, Benjamin Becker and the Australian John Milkman.

Following is the list of matches in the top half round of 64 to be played on Wednesday, with my pick mentioned first :-

Novak Djokovic (1) v. Adrian Mannarino
Sam Querrey (28) v. Thomaz Bellucci
Pierre Hughes Herbert (-) v. Damir Dzumhur
David Ferrer (13) v. Nicolas Mahut
David Goffin (11) v. Eduardo Roger Vasselin
Denis Istomin v. Nicolas Almagro
Jack Sock (27) v. Robin Haase
Milos Raonic (6) v. Andreas Seppi
Roger Federer (3) v. Marcus Willis
Alexander Dolgopolov (30) v. Daniel Evans
Steve Johnson v. Jeremy Chardy
Giles Simon (16) v. Grigor Dmitrov
Marin Cilic (9) v. Sergiy Stakhovsky
Ivo Karlovic (23) v. Lukas Lacko
Gilles Muller v. Andrey Kuznetsova
Kei Nishikori (5) v. Julien Benneteau.

In the ladies section of the draw, two time major winner Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia sent the former world number one Caroline Wozniacki out of the tournament with 7-5, 6-4 win on Center court under the roof as rain disrupted play on all other courts as rain stopped play.

– Rasesh Mehta [Rasesh Mehta is an analyst with the Tennis Galaxy. You can reach him at the email: sportzcosmos@gmail.com]