Massu, Clavet advance at Salem Open

HONG KONG, Sept. 24 (UPI) -- Chile's Nicolas Massu and Spaniard Francisco Clavet won their first-round matches Tuesday before rain suspended play at the $400,000 Salem Open.

Massu, who is seeking his first title since winning on clay at Buenos Aries in February, posted a 7-5, 6-2 victory over Radek Stepanek" class="tpstyle">Czech Radek Stepanek in this hardcourt event.

Clavet, who was ousted in the first round in his previous two tournaments, got past Sweden's Magnus Larsson, 6-4, 6-4.

Three other matches got underway before the rain started. Second-seeded Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain, who is seeking his second title of 2002, holds a 6-2, 2-2 lead over Austrian Stefan Koubek. American Jeff Morrison is ahead of Japan's Takao Suzuki, 6-2, 1-1, and Sweden's Jonas Bjorkman and American Cecil Mamiit split the first six games of their match.

Russian Marat Safin, who won two singles matches over the weekend to lead Russia to victory in its semifinal tie with Argentina, is the top seed and faces German Lars Burgsmuller in the first round.

Third-seeded Carlos Moya of Spain has won four titles this season, with the most recent coming at Cincinnati in August.

Moya will try to win for the fourth time in five career meetings with American Jan-Michael Gambill. That match was scheduled for Tuesday.

Another Spaniard, Alex Corretja, is the fourth seed and takes on former champion Michael Chang of the United States in another match that was postponed. Chang, who received a wild card, won this event three times, most recently 1997. Chang, who recently hinted at retirement, has won the his only two meetings with Corretja.