Tsonga advances in Valencia Open tennis

World number eight Jo-Wilfred Tsonga struggled to victory against wild-card entry Javier Marti from Spain 4-6, 7-5, 6-2, here in the first round of the Valencia Open on Tuesday. The Frenchman, perhaps feeling the effects of his exploits in winning the Vienna Open on Sunday against Juan Martin del Potro in three sets, struggled in the first set against the Spaniard who is 182 in the ATP rankings. He soon recovered from that reverse to take a tight second set, before comfortably controlling the decisive third. Tsonga now goes on to meet the winner of the match between Latvia's Ernest Gulbis and Sam Querrey of the USA for a place in the last eight, and the chance to improve his end of year ranking and qualify for the ATP World Tour Finals in London later this month.