Madrid Round 2

After two days of action at the ATP Madrid Masters (three days for the women) there have been some surprising upsets already. Two of the three men's winners from last week's ATP events are already out, and the third nearly followed them. Albert Montanes's loss was the least surprising, as he was facing big-hitting Ernests Gulbis. Montanes served for the first set at 5-4, but ended up losing 9 of the next 10 games. Tough loss, but Gulbis just blew him off the court. Sam Querrey, on the other hand, had no business losing to Challenger stalwart Daniel Munoz-De La Nava, who had never won an ATP level match before and was ranked 315. Querrey served for the match, again, and was broken, then lost it. Really disappointing performance from Sam, I'm not going to lie. Sam needs to stop losing serve when he's on the verge of winning a match. That's three of his losses since the clay-court season started, if you can believe that.

John Isner, on the other hand, managed to defeat a tougher opponent in Christophe Rochus. Another American made it through to the second when both Tomas Berdych and David Nalbandian withdrew with injury, so lucky losers Mardy Fish and Michael Russell took their places. I'm not sure I've ever seen that before, but Fish came through that one.

Oh right, the other tournament winner. Mikhail Youzhny looked down and out against Lukas Lacko, losing the first set 6-2, before he got back into the match and won it in three. His reward for that win? Ernests Gulbis in the second. If he's flat for as long as he was against Lacko, Gulbis will blow him off the court.

Looking ahead to some of the other exciting matches that we'll see tomorrow, there's quite a bevy of crackerjack matches. On center court, Andy Roddick finally starts his clay-court campaign against Feliciano Lopez, which is not a bad first match for the American. Following that, Nadal gets unfortunate Ukrainian victim Oleksander Dolgopolov Jr., which might last an hour, if Nadal's taking his time. And then Ferrer gets Marcos Baghdatis, a match which would normally be very exciting, but on clay, Ferrer gets better and Baggy gets worse. So expect Ferrer to win that one.

But this would be a great day to have a grounds pass at the Mutua Madrilena. Almagro and Soderling are playing on the second court, as are Andy Murray and Juan Ignacio Chela. The first match should be tight, but the second one is going to be a blowout - I just don't know for which player. If Murray has gotten his head together in the past week, he should win without much trouble, but if he's still playing like he's been playing since the Australian Open, it could be a long day at the office. Or a quick one, and he'll be heading to France early.

Way out on court four, Thomaz Bellucci is playing Juan Monaco, which is a great clay-court match to be on such a way out court. And that's not even mentioning the fact that court three has both of the William sisters in action. I guess they're not very popular in Spain, as their matches could both be exciting. Venus is playing Schiavone, while Serena is playing Petrova. Those could go either way. Meanwhile, on center court, in the second night match, the WTA put on... Lucia Safarova and Alexandra Dulgheru? What? The first WTA match of the day is actually a great one, so it's a bit puzzling that it's on first, as Serbian sensations Jelena Jankovic and Ana Ivanovic face off. That could be a good one, too. Strange scheduling going on.

Ah well. Mysteries of court placement and timing aside, that's a great day of tennis, and that's why the second or third round of Masters Series events can be some of the most exciting days in the tennis calendar.