TOKYO. Oct 9: India's ace Leander Pacs cleared the first hurdle beating Fredrik Jonsson of Sweden in a rain-delayed match on the opening day of the Japan Open tennis tournament on Monday, reports AFP.

Playing his first singles match after the Sydney Olympic Games. Paes had to wait for almost six hours before suddenly being called for the men's first round match to score a 7-6, 6-3 victory.

"That was the most difficult part today because of the ram delay. We didn't know when we are gonna go on In fact. I was in the hotel when I heard mv match as called." said Paes

I managed to come here quickly and there was only a 10-minute warm up and we |usi went to play. Maybe it should be rain-delayed every day. then I play better again.” he added.

Paes never showed the ill-effects of the delay as he stood firm on his serves and nevei faced a single break point while he hit an array of lightning forehand winners and a series of fine volley winners at the net.

"I serxed well today. 1 got a lot of good first serves in and hence my game was very’ aggressive. 1 was also able to hit a lot of second serves. I didn’t hit one double fault today, not one." said Pars.

"The only difference in the first set was the tie-break I managed to play a few good points, especially at five-all. 1 took a nice forehand approach winner and I was aggressive on it.

"It was really good, it was a lot of positive tennis for me today." added the 27-year-old from Calcutta, last year's Wimbledon and French Open doubles champion with his compatriot Mahesh Phupathi.

In the second round. Paes will take on either 16th seed Christophe Rochus of Belgium or Andrea Gaudenzi of Italy.

Top eight men's seeds and top two women's seeds received lirst-round byes . in the 97(U)(M)-doll,ir hard court tournament.

Jonas Bjorknian of Sweden, 13th seed, had to save two match points in the final set tiebreaker to beat American Jeff Tarango 6-4. 3-6. 7-6.

Andre Sa of Brazil outclassed Alex Calatrava of Spain 6-4. 0-6. 6-2. while Olivier Rochus of Belgium downed Chris Woodruff of the United States 7-5. 6-4.