Rising Australian tennis player John Millman has backed up his third round performance at the Australian Open by blitzing French wildcard Julien Benneteau in the first round at Open Sud de France.
Millman defeated the experienced Frenchman 6-3 6-0 with an impressive performance that lasted just over an hour.
Millman relied on excellent serving throughout the match to hit 11 aces and didn't face a single break point in the win.
In the first set he took advantage of a singular break point on the Benneteau serve to take it 6-3 before blitzing through the second set, breaking the Frenchman at will.
Millman, who rose 17 places in the rankings to 78 in the world after his third round loss to Bernard Tomic at the Australian Open, will now face either fifth seed Gael Monfils or his fellow Frenchman Edouard Roger-Vasselin in the second round.
Earlier erratic Latvian Ernests Gulbis set up a second round clash with top-seeded Frenchman Richard Gasquet with a 6-4 6-3 win over French youngster Quentin Halys.
Two seeded players were also upset in the first round at Montpellier while local favourite Paul-Henri Mathieu advanced in straight sets.
Ruben Bemelmans toppled sixth-seeded Joao Sousa 6-4 3-6 6-4 on Tuesday and Michael Berrer defeated seventh seed Borna Coric 7-6 (7-5) 6-2.
Mathieu saved all seven break points to beat teenager Elias Ymer 6-1 6-4 and set up an all-French second-round match with fourth-seeded Benoit Paire.
Also Jan-Lennard Struff beat Nicolas Mahut 6-3 7-5 and qualifier Dustin Brown had a 7-5 7-5 victory over Steve Darcis.
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