Gustavo Kuerten won the highlight match of the Paris Masters first round when he took advantage of American Mardy Fish's poor serving to win 6-4 7-6 on Tuesday.

Both men had won titles last weekend -- Kuerten in St Petersburg and Fish his debut trophy in Stockholm -- but the Brazilian was in charge from the outset.

Kuerten, three times a French Open winner, broke Fish's service midway through the first set and he had a break point for 6-5 in the second after yet another a sloppy service game by his opponent.

Although Fish rescued himself to win that game with an ace, the American served his ninth double fault in the tiebreak and hit a series of simple returns into the net to lose it 7-2.

Younes El Aynaoui can no longer take the eighth and final spot in the year-ending Masters Cup in Houston after retiring in the third set of his second round match against fellow Moroccan Hicham Arazi.

El Aynaoui, seeded 12th, had suffered muscle inflammation in his heel when he reached the semi-finals in Madrid two weeks ago and he almost pulled out before this tournament after seeing his doctor in Bordeaux.

"It was hurting from the very first point and I stopped rather than not being able to put my foot on the ground tomorrow.

"I'm happy with what I've achieved this year and my only regret is losing to (Nicolas) Massu in Madrid. If you proposed the same season to me next year, I would take it."

KEPT ALIVE

The top eight players in the ATP Champions Race on November 3 qualify for next month's Masters Cup.

The battle for the eighth spot is now between Argentina's David Nalbandian (392 points), Mark Philippoussis of Australia (322), France's Sebastien Grosjean (321) and Thailand's Paradorn Srichaphan (304).

If Nalbandian wins one match here, Paradorn can no longer qualify. Philippoussis, who plays unseeded Kuerten in the second round, and Grosjean almost certainly have to win the title and hope the Argentine loses early in the tournament.

Arazi plays eighth seed Paradorn in the third round after the Thai beat Karol Beck of Slovakia 7-6 6-3.

Jonas Bjorkman kept alive Sweden's chances of winning a men's singles title every year since 1974 by beating Agustin Calleri of Argentina 6-4 7-6 and he now plays Nalbandian.

Mikhail Youzhny, the hero of Russia on his last visit to the Bercy stadium, went down 7-6 6-3 to Spain's Feliciano Lopez. Youzhny won the final match of the Davis Cup final against France's Paul-Henri Mathieu in 2002 after being two sets down.

"It's good to come back but that was a year ago and I don't think about it... (there was) too much attention for one person," he said wryly.

The evening session starts with top seed Juan Carlos Ferrero of Spain against France's Nicholas Mahut followed by second seed Andy Roddick playing Romanian Victor Hanescu.

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