Haas through in Halle after Tomic retires

Former Halle champion Tommy Haas booked his place in the second round after his opponent Australian Bernard Tomic was forced to pull out of the match at 5-2 in the German’s favour.

Tomic, who has been ill for the past few days, decided to give up the fight after 22 minutes of play.

Haas received some great news today, the Wimbledon organisers granted him a wild card for this year’s Grand Slam event.

“The qualifying is staged in Roehampton, which is a different venue, and I don’t know if I would have put myself through that,” said Haas after finding out about the news.

Also through is German Florian Mayer after defeating American qualifier Tim Smyczek 6-4  6-4, setting up a second round encounter against the former Swiss world no.1 Federer.

In the other first round matches, Czech Radek Stepanek overcame 7th seed Italian Andreas Seppi 7-6 (6)  4-6  7-6 (7), 6th seed Spaniard Marcel Granollers beat German qualifier Misha Zverev 6-4  6-2 and Serbian Viktor Troicki eliminated Benjamin Becker of Germany 6-2  7-6 (6).

Tags andreas seppi Benjamin Becker Bernard Tomic Florian Mayer gerry weber open Halle Tennis Marcel Granollers Misha Zverev Radek Stepanek Roger Federer tennis news Tim Smyczek Tommy Haas Viktor Troicki