Easy win for Djokovic but Raducanu out with injury

Novak Djokovic enjoyed a comfortable start to his bid to retain the No 1 world ranking with a straight-sets win over Aslan Karatsev in the Italian Open yesterday.

The Serbian top seed must reach the semi-finals in Rome to prevent Daniil Medvedev from taking over at the top of the ATP rankings and Djokovic coasted into the third round with a 6-3, 6-2 victory.

Top seed Djokovic, who reached the semi-finals in Madrid last week where he lost to eventual winner Carlos Alcarez, broke world No 35 Karatsev’s serve four times.

The 20-time Grand Slam winner will now take on countryman Laslo Djere or former world No 3 Stan Wawrinka in the next round. Djokovic has never lost before the quarter-finals at the tournament and is now just three victories shy of joining the 1,000 match-wins club.

“You never know with him. If he’s feeling the ball, he can be very dangerous because he stays so close to the line, puts pressure on his opponents,” Djokovic said of the 35thranked Russian Karatsev.

Grigor Dimitrov and Stefanos Tsitsipas will square off for the second time in seven days after the Bulgarian moved past American qualifier Brandon Nakashima 6-3, 6-4 in the first round. It was Dimitrov’s 10th Masters 1000 match-win of the season and he’ll be searching for just a second victory over Tsitsipas in their sixth meeting.

In the women’s tournament, Britain’s Emma Raducanu was forced to retire with a back injury when she was a set and a break down to Canadian Bianca Andreescu in their first-round match.

Raducanu, 19, retired after just over an hour, telling the umpire: “I can’t move.”