"I'm just trying to improve my game," said the holder of two titles in two months during 2005, at Adelaide and Marseille. "If I win the matches, the ranking will come as well."
Johansson is the newest member of the Top ten, reaching ninth after his Sunday trophy in France. His "modest" 14-ace performance at the Ahoy stadium in an opening victory over his Asian opponent now sets him up against a compatriot.
Johansson will clash Thursday with namesake - but unrelated - compatriot Thomas Johansson.
"I want to improve everything - and I think I can," said Johansson, dubbed "Pim-Pim. "I'm still not serving like I'd wish to. I'm serving well during maybe every other match."
Johansson threw in nine double faults in his first-round win, which took just short of two hours. He reaped plenty of break points but only converted on four of 17.
The Swede, whose father Lief played tennis with Bjorn Borg in the 1970s, said that making the switch from Marseille to Rotterdam was not too difficult.
Johansson is competing at Rotterdam instead of defending his career-first title, achieved a year ago this week in Memphis. "I'd heard a lot about this tournament from the other Swedish guys. I wanted to try something different."
Swiss Stanislas Wawrinka produced a surprise, earning the best victory of a modest career with an upset of former world number four Sebastien Grosjean of France 7-6 (7/5), 6-2.
Wawrinka, pure Swiss, despite his Polish surname, is likely to face celebrated compatriot Roger Federer - assuming the world number one and top seed gets past an opening-round contest later against Czech qualifier Bohdan Ulihrach.
ANTWERP DIAMOND GAMES WTA:
BRUSSELS: Second round results from the $585,000 Antwerp Diamond Games WTA tennis tournament on Wednesday (prefix number denotes seeding): 7-Patty Schnyder (Switzerland) beat Camille Pin (France) 6-3 4-6 6-1; 3-Venus Williams (US) beat Virginie Razzano (France) 6-3 6-O.