Federer and Wawrinka march ahead

MIAMI: Roger Federer survived a brave challenge from American qualifier Frances Tiafoe before emerging with a 7-6 (7/2), 6-3 victory as he got his Miami Masters title bid underway on Saturday.

Tiafoe, ranked 101st in the world, struggled against Federer’s serve but was strong on his own and forced a first set tie-break in which the Swiss came out on top.

The 19-year-old son of immigrants from Sierra Leone then broke Federer’s serve in the first game of the second set only for the 18-times Grand Slam winner to break back twice and run out a comfortable winner in the end.

Federer was full of praise for his opponent and said he would have gained valuable experience from the contest.

“I hope he’s going to learn a lot from a match like this just because playing on a centre court with a lot of people, under pressure, saving break points, making break points, playing breakers. That’s what it’s about, and it should feed a player like him with a lot of energy moving forward,” he said.

Federer is in fine form having clinched the

Australian Open and Indian Wells so far this year and extended his record to 14-1.

The 35-yearold is looking for his third Miami title following wins in 2005 and 2006.

Reigning US Open champion Stan Wawrinka got off to a solid start, beating Argentina’s Horacio Zeballos 6-3, 6-4 at Crandon Park on Saturday.

Top seed Wawrinka will face Malek Jaziri next after the Tunisian beat Feliciano Lopez 6-3, 4-6, 6-3.

Australia’s Nick Kyrgios also progressed on Saturday enjoying a 6-4, 6-3 win over Bosnian Damir Dzumhur.

In the women’s Miami Open event, fifth seed Agnieszka Radwanska had her bid to repeat her 2012 success ended by Croatian veteran Mirjana Lucic-Baroni at Crandon Park on Saturday.

But second-seed Karolina Pliskova fought past Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstan 7-5, 6-3 to move into the last 16 and Slovak Dominika Cibulkova also progressed with a comfortable two sets win over Belgium’s Kirsten Flipkens.

Lucic-Baroni is enjoying an unexpected upturn in her fortunes at the age of 35 and in January reached the semi-final of the Australian Open — 18 years after her previous appearance in the last four of a slam, in 1999 at Wimbledon.

Spain’s sixth seeded Garbine Muguruza is doing it the hard way in Florida this week.

After battling back to beat American Christina McHale in three, rain interrupted, sets on Friday, the Caracas-born Muguruza had to pull out the stops again to deal with China’s Zhang Shuai 4-6, 6-2, 6-2 in just over two hours.