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Ivanisevic spoils Canadian party

Tenth-seed Goran Ivanisevic didn't do tennis fans at Toronto any favours, when he dumped local hero Sebastien Lareau 7-6 (14-12), 7-6 (7-4) on the opening day of the $4,450,000 Canadian Open.

A civic holiday in Toronto and a promotion package letting in families for free resulted in a throng of 20,346 fans at the venue -- but Goran aced their hopes of cheering a home boy on to an unlikely triumph.

The game had several twists and turns, with Ivanisevic living up to his own self-description when he said, recently, that his biggest enemy was himself. Three double faults in a row saw him down 3-4 in the opening set, but the Croat then broke the 95th-ranked Canadian, and went on to win the resulting tiebreak on his sixth set point with a blistering service return.

Lareau again led 5-2 in the second set but Ivanisevic rallied and finished the tiebreak, and the match, with his 20th ace.

Ivanisevic on the day handled the pressures of the tiebreak better than he did at Wimbledon -- but then, on that occasion, the man across the net was world number one Pete Sampras.

"Even half the time today, I was thinking about Wimbledon and I'm still having trouble finding my motivation," Ivanisevic said after the game. "I'm thinking if I could have made those two service returns (on set points in the second-set tiebreak), I could have won Wimbledon."

In other action, MaliVai Washington of the United States posted the day's sole upset when he dumped 13th-seeded Jan Siemerink of the Netherlands 7-6 (7-2) 6-3.

Wayne Black defeated brother Byron 6-4, 6-0. Wayne is number 105 in the world, while Byron is 32.

In a sentimental game, Australian Scott Draper outlasted American Jim Courier 7-5 5-7 6-4.

"We both played to a high standard," said Draper, who was able to get the better of Courier with aggressive groundstrokes. Meanwhile, a pensive, despondent Courier sat immobile by himself on the steps of a tournament van for about 45 minutes.

For Courier, it is one more nightmare in a long list as he fights to come close to his erstwhile peak.