Davydenko stutters to win

The Russian struggled throughout much of the first two sets but ran away with the third after Robredo appeared to self-destruct having made two soft volley errors to surrender his serve at 1-2.

Davydenko started the first set slowly as Robredo took the early initiative breaking in very first game.

The Russian soon settled and began to show the sort of form that carried him to the Paris Masters title two weeks ago dictating the rallies and pushing his opponent around the court.

But the unforced errors returned to Davydenko's game and when Robredo broke to take a 6-5 lead it look as if the Spaniard had the first set wrapped up.

It was Robredo's turn to put in a poor service game, however, and when Davydenko took the set 10-8 in tie-break it was more due to errors rather than any sort of dominance.

Coming out firing on all cylinders early in the second set Robredo raced to a 4-1 lead before Davydenko appeared to know what was going on.

But again Robredo's lead was more due to the errors from Davydenko rather than the Spaniard's ability to create any kind of dominance.

The third set again was characterised by errors although this time they were flying from Robredo's racquet.

Robredo had chances to level the final set scores at 2-2 but hit two forehand volley errors - one into the net and the second wide - to surrender his serve.

From there the Spaniard never recovering lashing at the ball in frustration before seemingly accepting the inevitable as Davydenko hit his way to an unconvincing win.

While he has got the first win under his belt, Davydenko will need to improve significantly if he is to beat James Blake - who shocked Rafael Nadal earlier in the day with a straight sets win - and Nadal - who will be keen to get his campaign back on track - if he is to qualify for the semi-finals.

"It was not nerves," Davydenko said.

"It was lack of preparation for this tournament because I made so many mistakes."