Paris - Roger Federer produced a near-perfect display of tennis to open his Paris Masters campaign with a 6-1, 6-1 second round win over Italian Andreas Seppi on Wednesday.
The Swiss veteran has only once won what is traditionally the last of the nine Masters 1000 tournaments - in 2011 when he beat Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the final.
And this year he has won only one Masters title, that coming in Cincinnati ahead of the US Open, the others going to Novak Djokovic (5) and Andy Murray (2).
Against Seppi he brought in a 12-1 head-to-head record with the sole defeat coming earlier this year at the Australian Open.
Playing for the first time in the refurbished Paris Bercy indoor stadium where the capacity has been increased to over 20,000, Federer was sharp from the start.
He led 4-0 after just 10 minutes and had pocketed the first set 6-1 nine minutes later.
It was all too fast and fiery for a bewildered Seppi who dropped his serve again to fall 2-0 down in the second.
It was all one-way traffic as Federer quickly put Seppi out of his misery, winning in just 47 minutes.
He next goes up against American John Isner for a place in the quarter-finals