Andy Murray has always said clay is his weakest surface.  He plays on the surface anywhere from 3-4 tournaments a year, and he didn’t grow up on the surface.  Prior to his work with Lendl, the clay didn’t support his flatter, less aggressive style.  Although Murray has been classified as a counterpuncher, he doesn’t spin the ball the way David Ferrer does, and therefore his shots can get a bit iffy if pressed in long rallies.  Lots of practice helps him play consistent ball.

Under Lendl, Murray had been working on getting spinnier shots.  Anyone who has paid attention to Murray’s play the last few months will see high, short (half way between the service line and base line), down-the-line looper.  It lacks pace, but it places the ball up high and makes a player have to deal with it.

Murray’s opponent today was expected to give him trouble.  Stan Wawrinka’s best surface is clay.  He feels most comfortable playing here despite a game that works well on hard courts.  The two had only met each other on clay twice with Wawrinka winning both meetings, though they hadn’t played each other on clay in 5 years.

The match could be summarized on two key observations.  One, Murray was hitting poorly, making frequent errors, much more than in his previous matches.  Two, Wawrinka was holding his serve relatively easily.  While Murray broke Roger-Vasselin numerous times yesterday, he didn’t break Wawrinka at all today, and Wawrinka cruised to an easy 61 62 win.

Last year, Murray had reached the quarterfinals of Monte Carlo, so he loses out one round earlier.  Although Murray is ranked number 2 in the world, it’s a slim margin of less than 100 points over Roger Federer.  Federer skipped Monte Carlo last year as he did this year as well, so he’s not going to lose any points.  Meanwhile, Murray will lose 90 points.  Given he only has an 80 point lead over Federer, Federer will be number 2, but only by 10 points, and Federer has more points to defend heading into the French Open.  Murray, who had a relatively good 2011 on clay, had a relatively poor 2012 on clay, so he has few points to defend.  However, he’ll need to pick up the level of his play if he wants to head into the French as the number 2 seed.

While Murray struggled, the king of clay, Rafael Nadal showed that he’s still king.  While he didn’t face someone at the level of Stan Wawrinka, he did play Kohlschreiber, who can be tough, but just came off a 3-setter in his previous round.  Richard Gasquet continues to show his affinity for clay and beat Marin Cilic in two close sets.  Dimitrov continues to show improvement on clay with an easy win over Florian Mayer.  Tsonga also had a surprisingly easy time over Melzer, 63 60.

There were upsets, however.  Tomas Berdych, who has been playing more consistently as of late, was demolished by Fognini, 64 62.  Djokovic has started slow for the second match in a row, losing his opening set to Juan Monaco, though he is leading in the second set.  Juan Martin del Potro lost the first set to Jarkko Nieminen, and they are just starting out the second set.