August 06, 2008	Wednesday	Sha’aban 3, 1429

LOS ANGELES, Aug 5: American Mardy Fish picked up his first victory since June when he eased to a 6-2, 6-2 triumph over Alejandro Falla of Colombia to reach the second round of the Los Angeles Classic on Monday.

The sixth seed needed just 61 minutes to set up a clash with either compatriot Vince Spadea or Frenchman Sebastien Grosjean.

Fish went into the tournament on the back of four straight defeats but from the moment he broke serve in the third game, he was in complete control against the world No 121.

After wrapping up the first set, Fish broke in the first game of the second set on his way to a comfortable victory.

Earlier on Monday, German Denis Gremelmayr also returned to winning ways, beating Italian Fabio Fognini 6-4, 6-2 in another first round encounter.

Gremelmayr had not won a match since April but was still too good for the Italian, easing through to a second-round meeting with fourth seed Feliciano Lopez of Spain.

In other matches, there were wins for two Frenchmen, Marc Gicquel and Florent Serra.

Gicquel cruised past local hope Zach Fleishman 6-3, 6-0 to set up a match against eighth seed Tommy Haas of Germany or American Donald Young.

Serra beat Kazakhstan qualifier Andrey Golubev 6-4, 6-1 and next faces second seed Fernando Vedasco of Spain.

Monday’s results (prefix number denotes seeding):

First round: Marc Gicquel (France) bt Zack Fleishman (US) 6-3, 6-0; Florent Serra (France) bt Andrey Golubev (Kazakhstan) 6-4, 6-1; Denis Gremelmayr (Germany) bt Fabio Fognini (Italy) 6-4, 6-2; 6-Mardy Fish (US) bt Alejandro Falla (Colombia) 6-2, 6-2.—Reuters