Today, in Tokyo, there were quite a few three setters.

Murray had a pretty tough opening round playing Marcos Baghdatis who reached the finals of Kuala Lumpur last week.  He needed three sets to beat the Cypriot.  Tipsarevic, who won Kuala Lumpur, had chances to beat Tursunov but despite being breaks up on him, Tursunov kept coming back and eventually beat the Serb in 3 sets.

Bernard Tomic needed three sets to beat Japanese player, Tatsuma Ito, showing he still struggles against players that aren’t ranked that highly.  Stepanek needed 3 sets to beat Swiss #3, Marco Chiudinelli.

About the only guy who had it easy was Mardy Fish who beat Ernests Gulbis in two easy sets.

Andy Murray gets to play Alex Bogomolov for the third time this year, just as Murray has played Donald Young for the third time.  Both Young and Bogomolov beat Murray in back-to-back tournaments.  Young beat Murray back in Indian Wells while Bogomolov beat Murray in Miami.  Both Young and Bogomolov are having career years this year, so it really says more about how well they are playing that Murray is playing them again.  Still, Andy Murray and David Ferrer are expected to reach the semifinals, although Ferrer would have to play the veteran Radek Stepanek en route (assuming he meets Stepanek).

In Beijing, Berdych dropped only 2 games in beating German Kohlschreiber.  Verdasco needed 3 sets to beat Italian Cipolla.  Ljubicic also needed 3 sets to beat German, Florian Mayer.  Youzhny also needed 3 sets to beat Feliciano Lopez.