Struff storms into second round

Jan-Lennard Struff cruises past his Chinese opponent in the first round. But it was the end of the line for Otte and Altmaier. Kyrgios was also eliminated.

Struff will face a real tough opponent in the second round. Struff hasn’t won a set in four matches so far against Tommy Paul of the US (winning 6-3, 6-4 against Bonzi of France). "There are opponents like that," Struff explained at the press conference after his smooth 6-1, 6-4 victory over Zhizhen Zhang of China. "Some players suit you better, some not so much. Paul takes the pace off the ball well and moves very well."

For Oscar Otte, last year's semifinalist at the BOSS OPEN, it was already over in the first round. In the 4-6, 3-6 defeat against Frenchman Gregoire Barrere, however, the 29-year-old from Cologne went into the match severely handicapped: after his doubles on Monday, Otte ended up in bed with fever and chills. "In the morning, the fever went down and I definitely wanted to give it a try."

Daniel Altmaier lost his first-round appearance at the Weissenhof to Australia's Christopher O'Connell 3-6, 1-6 and admitted afterwards to feeling "uncomfortable on the court. At the moment, I simply don't have any consistency as to what I actually want to play. I'm still looking for what my game actually is on grass, even in practice." However, Altmaier also took positives from the defeat, saying, "There's so much to improve on grass, and I can start doing that in training tomorrow."

The early exit also came for two stars of the tournament: Australian Nick Kyrgios was defeated 5-7, 3-6 by China's Yibing Wu in his first ATP match in 2023. Denis Shapovalov gave up a 1-0 set lead against Hungarian qualifier Marton Fucsovics and was defeated 6-3, 3-6, 4-6.

Frenchman Corentin Moutet and Aslan Karasev were on the court for more than three hours. In the end Karatsev prevailed 7-6 (0), 6-7 (8), 7-5.