As usually I missed the first match by minutes which was Verdasco versus Lapentti. I haven't seen the Ecuadorian play since he almost beat Costa at the 2003 French Open, so I was actually a bit sad at not seeing him, but never mind about that.

Calleri d Gaudio 7-5 6-0

Well, the dream of Gaudio defending his title went to dust. He opened solidly, defending absoloutly amazingly against the massive Calleri attacks. Calleri broke to lead 3-2, but Gaston broke back and was 4-4 40-0 up on his own serve when his game just went down a gear - he still won that game, but he was not the same Gaudio anymore. When Calleri held to 5-5, Gaston started to get frustrated, and when Calleri broke to lead 6-5 after a huge rally Gaston broke his racket and got a warning for racket abuse.

When Calleri won the first set, it was all over. Gaston played some unbelivable points in the second set, the kind of points which make you wonder how he lost the set to love, but looked like he didn't care anymore. Should it have been any other player, I would have placed him on my black list for tanking, but I just love Gaston too much. Now it's up for Calleri to win this title - vamos Augustin!

Youzhny d Melzer 6-3 3-6 6-3

This was the match of the day, with the crowd coming to life yet again thanks to Melzer, whom I grew to like. The local boy wasn't at his best at all - he was still flashy, still hit some huge backhands down the line, followed plenty of shots to the net (and you know how much I love net-rushers!) and tried some ridiculous -shots off returns of serve, but it just wasn't clicking. He served really well in the second set, but couldn't find his serve at the right moments of the third set and didn't take his chances on the Youzhny service games.

Youzhny played a great match. This was the first time I watched him this week. He is really a player who is metamorphosic - I remember his imitation of the Becker serve back in 2002 and his strange Borg like backhand. He is much more elegant now, can rally superbly and is just generally a great player, but I just can't get to like him. I also can't understand why he's not having a great year - he looks really good. He has no weakness as far as the groundstrokes are concerned, he's quite fast and has a good serve. I hope he'll keep this up, I might not like him too much, but he deserves to do well.

Chela d Kohlschreiber 6-4 6-4

Philip broke to lead 1-4 in the first set and things were looing good, but then he lost eight of the next nine games to go 6-4 3-1 down. I wanted him to win as I also grew to like him, but today I saw why he is not ranked higher - after the amazing match he played against Nieminen, he was just not lighted up today, it's like he didn't get out of bed. He was anemic and deserved to lose.

Chela played a solid match, but I can't get myself to like him. I used to like him back in 2002 when he had that strange looking service motion and had great results on hard-courts (including that huge match against Roddick at the US Open), but these days I don't like him at all. He has a nice looking forehand and a good serve, but the rest is just dull.

Five minutes after this match ended, rain started falling down, and it went down really strong for an hour or two. I hope it won't come tommorow as well.

The tournament is quite wide open now, though Verdasco is likely the favourite to win. I don't mind anyone winning really but Chela. I hope Calleri will finally get a big title, but I wouldn't be too down if Verdasco goes to win this, and Youzhny is not that bad himself.