French Open Tennis Championships : Lendl, Navratilova and Evert Breeze Into Second Round

Ivan Lendl, top-seeded among the men, and Martina Navratilova and Chris Evert, second and third among the women, won their opening matches Tuesday in the French Open, but two other seeded players were knocked out--one in an upset and one by an injury.

Lendl, who has won this tournament the last two years, defeated Philippe Pech of France, 6-0, 6-3, 6-4.

Navratilova beat Pat Medrado of Brazil, 6-0, 6-3, finishing her match just moments before Evert wrapped up her 6-1, 6-4 victory over Judith Wiesner of Austria.

Lori McNeil, the ninth-seeded women’s player, ousted Elly Hakami, 6-3, 6-2, but a foot injury forced 16th-seeded Mary Joe Fernandez to withdraw.

Fernandez’s place was taken by Luciana Corsato of Brazil, who made the most of her good fortune by beating Halle Cioffi, 6-0, 6-4.

The men’s 10th-seeded player, Anders Jarryd, was trounced, 6-4, 7-5, 6-1, by fellow Swede Joakim Nystrom.

With 11th-seeded Katerina Maleeva eliminated Monday, it left 29 seeded players in the second round.

Other men’s winners on the second day of the Grand Slam tournament included second-seeded Stefan Edberg of Sweden over Karel Novacek of Czechoslovakia, 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-2; Henri Leconte of France over Simon Youl of Australia, 6-3, 4-6, 6-7, 6-4, 6-3; Tim Mayotte over Carl Limberger of Australia, 6-1, 6-1, 6-4, and fourth-seeded Pat Cash of Australia over Jimmy Brown, 6-3, 6-1, 6-1.

Boris Becker of West Germany defeated Claudio Mezzadri of Switzerland, 6-4, 6-2, 7-5, but had trouble making his serve-and-volley game work on the soft clay.

Meanwhile, Slobodan Zivojinovic of Yugoslavia beat Aaron Krickstein, 6-4, 7-5, 2-6, 6-4, and 16-year-old Michael Chang defeated doubles specialist Robert Seguso, 7-5, 6-2, 6-3.

The victories were the first at the French Open for Wimbledon champion Cash and the eighth-seeded Mayotte after being first-round losers in their three previous appearances.

After losing in the first round here in 1982, 1983 and 1984, Mayotte simply skipped this tournament the next three years.

“I was a little bit nervous today,” he said, adding with a laugh: “It’s one of the great milestones of my career.”

Mayotte’s victory means all three seeded U.S. men survived their first-round matches. Ninth-seeded Andre Agassi and 16th-seeded John McEnroe advanced Monday.

Lendl needs this year’s title to become the first player since Bjorn Borg to win the French Open three straight years. With 17 weeks to go, he also is homing in on Jimmy Connors’ record of 159 weeks atop the men’s rankings.

Lendl said he is aiming to reach both goals.

“When I see a challenge, I like to do something. I don’t like to give up,” he said.

Before her first-round match, Evert, 33, the oldest woman in the tournament, was worried about a heel spur and bruise that forced her to pull out of the Italian Open earlier this month. After beating Wiesner, Evert said her inflamed heel spur is “100%.”

The oldest men’s player, 35-year-old Guillermo Vilas of Argentina, also won. He eliminated Leonardo Lavalle of Mexico, 6-2, 6-3, 6-2. Lavalle was 9 years old when Vilas won the French Open in 1977.