BARCELONA, April 29: Argentine Guillermo Canas, still rebuilding after a left wrist injury, opened his Barcelona Open campaign on Monday with a 6-1, 6-4 first-round win over unseeded Spaniard Oscar Hernandez.

Ninth seed Canas, the runner-up to Rafael Nadal last year, cruised through the first set and kept his concentration in the second to see off Hernandez, ranked 72.

Having missed the Australian Open because of injury, Canas returned to the tour in Acapulco in late February and reached the semi-finals of the ATP event in Las Vegas.

The 30-year-old, now ranked 31, will play either Russian Teimuraz Gabashvili or his compatriot Guillermo Coria, the former French Open runner-up who was granted a wildcard.

Croatian Mario Ancic, himself in the early stages of a comeback from illness and injury, crushed German Mischa Zverev 6-1, 6-0 to set up a second-round meeting with seventh seed Andy Murray of Britain.

Ancic, who was ranked in the top 10 in 2006, missed six months of 2007 because of glandular fever, but has climbed to the verge of the world’s top 50 thanks to a run of form that included a final appearance in Marseille in February, where he lost to Murray.

“I think he was struggling a little bit on the clay,” Ancic said of Zverev.

“I was happy that I played solid from the first to the last point. It’s never easy when you win the first set so easy but I played well, served well and didn’t let anything slip through my hands.

“I’m still looking for my game a little bit but hopefully it [the Murray match] is going to be a good battle.”

Spanish 13th seed Fernando Verdasco was a first-round casualty, going down 6-3, 6-4 to Nicolas Lapentti of Ecuador.

Another Argentine, Juan Ignacio Chela, a late replacement for former French Open champion Juan Carlos Ferrero, who pulled out on the eve of the event with a groin injury, rallied past Spaniard Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 6-7, 6-4, 6-2.

Russian Dmitry Tursunov, seeded 15, won his first match on clay since last year’s French Open when he ousted big-serving South African Kevin Anderson 6-4, 6-3, while Dutchman Robin Haase beat Max Mirnyi of Belarus 6-2, 6-2 and now plays sixth seed Tommy Robredo.

Top seed Nadal was slated to begin his bid for a fourth successive Barcelona title on Wednesday against the winner of the first-round match between Italian Potito Starace and Australian Peter Luczak.

Monday’s results (prefix number denotes seeding):

First round: Agustin Calleri (Argentina) bt Thomas Johansson (Sweden) 6-1, 6-3; Denis Gremelmayr (Germany) bt Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo (Spain) 7-6 (9-7), 2-1 — Ramirez Hidalgo retired; 9-Guillermo Canas (Argentina) bt Oscar Hernandez (Spain) 6-1, 6-4; 14-Stanislas Wawrinka (Switzerland) bt Jose Antonio Sanchez de Luna (Spain) 6-3, 6-3; Nicolas Lapentti (Ecuador) bt 13-Fernando Verdasco (Spain) 6-3, 6-4; Marcos Daniel (Brazil) bt Ivan Navarro (Spain) 6-1, 6-4; Daniel Gimeno (Spain) bt Santiago Ventura (Spain) 6-2, 6-1; Marc Lopez (Spain) bt Ivo Minar (Czech Republic) 3-1 — Minar retired; Gabriel Trujillo (Spain) bt Werner Eschauer (Austria) 6-4, 4-6, 6-2; Robin Haase (Netherlands) bt Max Mirnyi (Belarus) 6-2, 6-2; Juan Ignacio Chela (Argentina) bt Guillermo Garcia-Lopez (Spain) 6-7 (2-7), 6-4, 6-2; Mario Ancic (Croatia) bt Mischa Zverev (Germany) 6-1, 6-0; 15-Dmitry Tursunov (Russia) bt Kevin Anderson (South Africa) 6-4, 6-3; Yuri Schukin (Russia) bt Robby Ginepri (US) 6-4, 6-2.

MATHIEU ADVANCES