Montreal Masters: Nick Kyrgios, Juan Martin del Potro move into second round; Lucas Pouille ousted

Montreal: A still-hurting Nick Kyrgios cruised into the second round of the ATP Montreal Masters on Monday with a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Viktor Troicki. A 51-minute outing was just what the doctor ordered for 16th-seeded Kyrgios, who had retired from his three prior matches because of injuries. [caption id=“attachment_3906617” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Nick Kyrgios hits a forehand against Viktor Troicki during the Rogers Cup. Reuters[/caption] “Still in pain, but I played OK today,” said Kyrgios, who had quit matches at Queen’s Club and Wimbledon with a nagging hip injury then was booed off the court in Washington last week when he retired against 106th-ranked American Tennys Sandgren with right shoulder trouble. The 22-year-old Australian, ranked 24th in the world, admitted the setbacks have sapped his morale. “I’ve been struggling the last couple months with a bunch of things,” Kyrgios said. “I wake up, I want to play. And then I wake up and, I don’t know, some days I don’t. “I felt good today, obviously. I didn’t feel like I hit the ball extremely well. I didn’t serve great. I thought I served OK. But he played far from his best tennis,” Kyrgios said. Troicki has struggled of late with injury as well, also retiring from his first-round match at Wimbledon. “We’re kind of in the same boat,” Kyrgios said. Kyrgios broke Troicki twice in each set while never facing a break point. Even so, he needed seven match points to finally put the 45th-ranked Serb away. Kyrgios’s run of injury trouble has derailed what started out as a promising season for a player whose talent has often been overshadowed by his tantrums. He reached the semi-finals at Marseille, Acapulco and Miami, and notched impressive victories over Novak Djokovic at Marseille and Indian Wells. But illness forced him out of his scheduled Indian Wells quarter-final against Roger Federer, and he withdrew from Monte Carlo with elbow trouble and Rome with the hip injury that continued to dog him through Wimbledon. “I’m getting a lot of treatment, trying to do my rehab every day,” Kyrgios said. “I’m doing everything I can, I guess.” In later games, Juan Martin del Potro withstood 24 aces from John Isner to knock off the big-serving American 7-5, 7-5. Del Potro, a 2009 finalist at Montreal, broke Isner’s service while tied at 5-5 in both sets to advance. Isner had been red hot after capturing back-to-back tournaments in July. “I got lucky to win tonight,” Del Potro said. “Hopefully I can get another draw in the next tournament because nobody wants to play against John in the first round.” Roberto Bautista Agut rolled past Tim Smyczek 7-6(4), 6-1, while American Jared Donaldson, 66th in the world, provided the first upset of the tournament by knocking out French 13th seed Lucas Pouille, twice a title winner this season, 7-6(5), 7-6(8). With inputs from agencies