Roger Federer, Eugenie Bouchard, Maria Sharapova in action at Australian Open

Ray Slover

Roger Federer, Eugenie Bouchard, Maria Sharapova in action at Australian Open image

Eugenie Bouchard returns to action at the Australian Open in third-round play at Melbourne Park. Also playing: Roger Federer, Andy Murray and Rafael Nadal.

Bethanie Mattek-Sands of the United States faces a difficult match against Simona Halep. Maria Sharapova faces a top-32 player as well.

Federer seeks his fourth Open title. He needed four sets to defeat Italy's Simone Bolelli and is dealing with an apparent finger injury. Reports say he was stung by a bee. After losing Thursday's first set, he rallied to win 3-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-2.

"I thought Simone played really well in the first set," Federer said, "so I really had to fight until the middle of the third set and once I got the break I was able to relax a little bit, but it was tough and I'm really pleased to come through.

"I was already seeing myself explaining losing in the second round and I'm happy I don't have to do that interview."

Play starts 11 a.m. Melbourne time, 7 p.m. ET. Here are the biggest singles matches of the day. [Seeds in brackets]

ROD LAVER ARENA

Eugenie Bouchard (Canada) [7] vs. Caroline Garcia (France)    

Andreas Seppi (Italy) vs. Roger Federer (Switzerland) [2]    

Zarina Diyas (Kazakhstan) [31] vs. Maria Sharapova (Russia) [2]    

Dudi Sela (Israel) vs. Rafael Nadal (Spain) [3]    

MARGARET COURT ARENA

Karolina Pliskova (Czech Republic) [22] vs. Ekaterina Makarova (Russia) [10]

Tomas Berdych (Czech Republic) [7] vs. Viktor Troicki (Serbia)    

Bethanie Mattek-Sands (United states) vs. Simona Halep (Romania) [3]    

Malek Jaziri (Tunisia) vs. Nick Kyrgios (Australia)    

HISENSE ARENA

Sara Errani (Italy) [14] vs. Yanina Wickmayer (Belgium)    

Carina Witthoeft (Germany) vs. Irina-Camelia Begu (Romania)    

Andy Murray (Great Britain) [6] vs. Joao Sousa (Portugal)    

Bernard Tomic (Australia) vs. Sam Groth (Australia)    

SHOW COURT 2

Yaroslava Shvedova (Kazakhstan) vs. Shuai Peng (China) [21]    

Kevin Anderson (South Africa) [14] vs. Richard Gasquet (France)

SHOW COURT 3

Marcos Baghdatis (Cyprus) vs. Grigor Dimitrov (Bulgaria) [10]

Ray Slover