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Nadal, Blake power through
18/03/2008 07:37 - (SA)
Indian Wells - Spaniard Rafael Nadal stayed on course for his first ATP title of the year with a 6-1 6-3 demolition of American wildcard Donald Young in the Pacific Life Open third round on Monday.
The defending champion and second seed outplayed his
18-year-old opponent from the baseline, sealing victory in one
hour, 22 minutes at Indian Wells Tennis Garden.
"All matches are important for me, but especially here
where I am defending my title because last year I played my
best tournament here," Nadal, 21, said in a courtside
interview.
"I didn't play my best tennis today, but I didn't play bad. I think he started very nervous. It was a comfortable match."
The muscular Spaniard, who beat Serb Novak Djokovic in last
year's final, broke Young in the first, third and seventh games to blast through the opening set.
In a match between two left-handers, the world number two
broke again in the sixth game of the second set when the
American teenager hit a forehand long before serving out for
the win.
Crushed
Nadal, who piled up six ATP titles in his 2007 campaign
including a third successive French Open, will next meet
Jo-Wilfried Tsonga who beat fellow Frenchman Paul-Henri Mathieu
7-6 6-4.
Ninth-seeded American James Blake powered past Spaniard
Carlos Moya 6-3 6-4 to set up a fourth-round clash with Richard
Gasquet of France, who crushed Argentina's Juan Ignacio Chela
6-2 6-1.
Urged on by partisan fans crammed into the Stadium Court,
Blake dominated the former world number one from the baseline
to wrap up victory in 75 minutes.
After breezing through the opening set, Blake traded a
service break with Moya in the second before again breaking his
opponent in the ninth game to lead 5-4.
The 28-year-old served out to book his place in the fourth
round, clinching the final point with a searing backhand winner
down the line.
"I'm very happy. I've had a lot of tough matches with him and I think that evened the score," Blake said after drawing level with Moya at 6-6 in career meetings.
"He's been the number one player in the world and he's a class act. Playing a guy like that, there's no way to expect to go through it smoothly so I'm really happy with getting through it in two sets."
Eighteenth-seeded Cypriot Marcos Baghdatis, runner-up at
the 2006 Australian Open, was upset 6-3 6-7 6-0 by Stanislas
Wawrinka of Switzerland.
Third-seeded Djokovic was scheduled to play Germany's
Philipp Kohlschreiber later on Monday.
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Rugby
