Tennis: Roger Federer was left distinctly unimpressed after he was forced to play the latter part of his second-round win over Thierry Ascione at the French Open in near-darkness last night.
The world number one and top seed powered through the opening two sets before encountering problems in the third as rain arrived and darkness set in.
He eventually claimed a 6-1 6-2 7-6 (10/8) success on Suzanne Lenglen court to set up a third-round clash with Italy's Potito Starace. But he was clearly unhappy at being sent on to play so late in the day.
"The conditions were shocking and I tried to get out of there as quickly as possible," he said. "It's not easy starting out knowing you have only an hour and 45 minutes or two hours to complete the match.
"I thought it was a hard call. I know they wanted to get the match over and done with. But what I didn't like was that they thought I'm the favourite, I should win this in straight sets, let's get Roger's match over with. What if it doesn't turn out that way? I'd be very upset. I was already not too happy at playing at such a late time. I hate playing into dawn.
"I could hardly see the ball and it's a very hard situation to deal with. You start stressing out."
It was a day to forget for the United States, with their nine-strong contingent of men's singles players making history for the wrong reasons.
Robby Ginepri's first-round defeat to Argentina's Diego Hartfield meant the US failed to provide a single player in the men's second-round draw at Roland Garros for the first time since the beginning of the Open era in 1968.
Meanwhile, home favourite Richard Gasquet was one of the big casualties on day four at Roland Garros, after his shock straight-sets defeat to unseeded Kristof Vliegen.
The 11th seed failed to find any kind of rhythm in his second-round clash and was brushed aside 7-6 6-3 6-1 by his Belgian opponent to end the host nation's best hope of success here.
Marat Safin's campaign was also ended at the second-round stage with a comprehensive 6-4 6-4 7-5 defeat at the hands of Janko Tipsarevic on Suzanne Lenglen court.
Fourth seed Nikolay Davydenko swept into the third round with a straight-sets victory over Austrian Werner Eschauer.
Ninth-seed Tommy Robredo also booked his place in the third round with a 6-4 7-5 6-4 victory over Konstantinos Economidis, the Spaniard setting up a mouth-watering tie with Tipsarevic.
Other second-round winners were Juan Carlos Ferrero, the 2003 champion, 15th-seed David Nalbandian and Gael Monfils, the Frenchman who defeated 18th-seed Juan Ignacio Chela in four sets.