Wildcard entry Julien Benneteau took less than an hour to beat fifth seed Martin Klizan in the first round of the Moselle Open on Monday.

There will be no third singles title of the year for Klizan, a semi-finalist in this tournament in 2015, after Benneteau breezed into round two with a resounding 6-2 6-1 victory in Metz.

Benneteau, 34, fired down nine aces and won 87 per cent of points on his first serve in a one-sided contest in which Klizan did not have a solitary break-point opportunity.

The experienced Benneteau sealed victory in only 57 minutes and will be up against either compatriot Paul-Henri Mathieu or Dustin Brown in the last 16.

Sixth seed Gilles Muller won the only other first-round match to be contested on day one of the indoor event, beating Horacio Zeballos of Argentina 7-6 (7-5) 7-5.