ATP

• Youzhny, Almagro win openers in Gstaad

  Gstaad, Switzerland (Sports Network) - Top seeds Mikhail Youzhny of Russia and Nicolas Almagro of Spain were a pair of first-round winners Tuesday at the Swiss Open.

  Youzhny rolled past French lucky-loser Marc Gicquel 6-2, 6-2 in 72 minutes, while Almagro held off fellow Spaniard Marcel Granollers 7-6 (7-5), 3-6, 6-3 in 2 hours, 14 minutes on the clay courts at Roy Emerson Arena.

  Gicquel entered the draw when Kazakhstan's Evgeny Korolev exited it with a back injury.

  Up next for Youzhny will be Swiss wild card Alexander Sadecky, while Almagro will encounter a Swiss wild card of his own, Michael Lammer.

  Last year's Gstaad titlist, Thomaz Bellucci, went by way of the upset on Day 3, as the third-seeded Brazilian was knocked out in three sets by heavy Swiss crowd favorite Marco Chiudinelli, 7-6 (8-6), 0-6, 6-4, in 2 hours, 15 minutes.

  Bellucci beat German Andreas Beck in last year's finale here.

  Two other seeds exited the draw on Tuesday, as Spaniard Daniel Gimeno-Traver tripped up No. 6 Romanian Victor Hanescu 6-4, 6-4 and Jeremy Chardy charged past No. 8 fellow Frenchman Paul-Henri Mathieu 6-1, 6-3. The struggling Hanescu was the champion here two years ago, while Mathieu was the Gstaad titlist in 2007.

  The 2009 Gstaad runner-up Beck continued his recent success at this event with a 6-3, 6-1 victory over Argentine wild card Agustin Velotti on Tuesday.

  Two other opening-round matches saw Finn Jarkko Nieminen edge out Brazil's Thiago Alves 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 and Kazakhstan's Yuri Schukin get past fellow countryman Andrey Golubev 7-6 (7-4), 2-6, 6-3.

  The 23-year-old Golubev was fresh off his first-ever ATP title, last week in Hamburg.

  07/27 15:03:30 ET