Nadal loses in Chennai doubles

By N.Ananthanarayanan

CHENNAI, India (Reuters) - World number two Rafael Nadal made a losing start to his new season on Monday when he and his partner Bartolome Salva-Vidal were defeated in their opening doubles match at the Chennai Open.

The French Open champion dropped serve once in each set as the 2007 finalists went down 6-4 6-4 against the first-time pairing of Cypriot Marcus Baghdatis, the singles second seed, and Marc Gicquel of France.

Baghdatis, the 2006 Australian Open finalist, was elated.

"It was tough but we didn't lose serve all match so I'm happy with our performance," he told reporters.

Defending champion Belgian Xavier Malisse returned after an injury-marred 2007 to ease to a 6-4 6-3 win over Gilles Muller of Luxembourg. Malisse upset top seed Nadal in the singles semi-finals last year.

The 27-year-old Belgian grabbed two early titles in 2007, in Chennai and Delray Beach, before a wrist injury sidelined him for six months and he dropped out of the top 100.

On Monday he showed his class against the error-prone Muller in the first-round clash between unseeded rivals lasting just under two hours.

SMOOTH START  Continued...