After a first round bye, local favourite Gael Monfils finally begins his campaign on Thursday.

It’s a case of old against new as Monfils enters the fray against Sebastian Grosjean who received a boost on Wednesday when Jarkko Nieminen pulled out. Grosjean edged past lucky loser Nicholas Mahut 7-6, 7-5. The veteran former world number four can’t have too many more seasons left in him but he will get the chance to show if he’s still got what it takes against top seed Monfils. They have played twice before, Grosjean winning the last meeting on a similar indoor surface in Marseille 2-6, 7-5, 6-3 but that was in 2006 when Monfils was still establishing himself on the tour.

Now things are likely to be very different, and Monfils is 1/7 with bet365 to make the quarters.

The pick of the second round matches is Ivan Ljubicic against Janko Tipsarevic. Ljubicic was made to work hard against big serving French qualifier De Chaunac, requiring a final set tiebreak while Tipsarevic enjoyed a more serene 6-4, 6-4 win over Arnaud Clement. Ljubicic leads 2-0 on the head-to-head but Tipsarevic is always dangerous indoors and could be a good bet at 11/10 with bet365.

Richard Gasquet scraped through 6-3, 2-6, 7-6 against qualifier Michael Berrer and now faces Christophe Rochus. Rochus had a similarly uneven battle with Fabrice Santoro, being demolished in set one before winning 0-6, 6-4, 7-6. Gasquet’s game matches up pretty well against the Belgian and he’s won three of their four matches but Rochus managed to wear him down in Barcelona earlier this year, 6-1, 6-7, 6-3. Given Gasquet’s rust, Rochus is very well priced at 11/4 with Sky Bet.

It’s a clash of serve-volleyers when Michael Llodra takes on Philipp Petzschner. The German made be seeded fourth but Llodra tends to raise his game in front of a home crowd and looks good at 11/10 with extrabet.