Paris: Twice champion Rafael Nadal showed no mercy on Italian qualifier Flavio Cipolla, sweeping him aside 6-2 6-1 6-4 to reach the third round of the French Open on Thursday.
World Number 2 Nadal, attempting to become the first man to win three successive titles at Roland Garros since Bjorn Borg in 1980, was in control straight away, opening up a 3-0 lead in the first set. Leading 5-1, the Spaniard was then broken but he underlined his determination by capturing Cipolla's serve immediately to take the set in 34 minutes
The second set was even more one-sided, Nadal going 3-1 up, breaking Cipolla again in the sixth game before serving for the set, which he took courtesy of an astute dropshot. The 20-year-old Nadal, whose 81-match streak on clay was ended by Roger Federer in the Hamburg final earlier this month, slowed down a bit after an early break but did enough to stay in control until he earned three match points.
A superb cross-court forehand winner on the first ended world number 227 Cipolla's suffering in a one-sided contest that laster under two hours.
"I was not able to play my best tennis but it was a good warmup", Nadal told reporters. The powerful left-hander, favoured to challenge world number one Federer in the June 10 final, will next meet fellow Spaniard Albert Montanes or Latvia's Ernests Gulbis. "I'm playing better and better every day and I'll fight every day a bit more", Nadal said. "There's only one way you can eliminate pressure and that's by playing well." The ultimate force on clay then revealed he had just been beaten by former champion Carlos Moya. With his Playstation.
Meanwhile, Lleyton Hewitt proved again the value of guts when he hit back from two sets down to crush former champion Gaston Gaudio at the French Open.
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The tenacious Aussie hustler, a former Wimbledon and U.S. Open champion, came through 4-6 3-6 6-2 6-4 6-2 to take his place in the third round along with two of the young guns of men's tennis still waiting for grand slam glory.
Serbian sixth seed Novak Djokovic, regarded by many as the most likely challenger to the Federer-Nadal monopoly, breezed past French qualifier Laurent Recouderc, the lowest ranked survivor in the men's draw, 6-3 3-6 6-3 6-1.
Marcos Baghdatis, just a year older than Djokovic at 21, also put down an impressive mark on the Roland Garros clay when the Cypriot 16th seed reached the third round for the first time with a 7-5 6-3 6-4 victory over Dane Kristian Pless.
"Everybody expects me to be one of the guys who can actually hurt the best two players in the world and I'm aware of that," Djokovic, who beat Nadal on the way to winning the Miami Masters series, told reporters. "There's a lot of expectation and pressure but I'm trying not to think about it too much." Rafael Nadal, unbeatable here in the last two years, was due on court later against Italian qualifier Flavio Cipolla.
World number two Maria Sharapova, still trying to master the claycourt craft, was the main attraction in early women's play. The 20-year-old Russian, recently back from a shoulder injury, showed no ill effects from a second match in two days when she thrashed American Jill Craybas 6-2 6-1.
Sharapova, twice a quarter-finalist here, was joined in round three by rising Serbian talent Ana Ivanovic, the seventh seed, who beat India's Sania Mirza 6-1 6-4.
American Venus Williams hit the fastest serve by a woman at a Grand Slam event on Wednesday.
Williams unleashed a 206 kilometres per hour serve in the second set against fellow American Ashley Harkleroad. The milestone is just 3 kph slower than Brenda Schultz-McCarthy's overall record of 209 kilometres per hour hit in qualifying for the Cincinnati tournament last year.
Venus won the match 6-1, 7-6 to reach third round.
Experienced Swiss Patty Schnyder, playing here for the 12th consecutive year, also reached the third round with a 6-3 6-2 defeat of Ukraine's Kateryna Bondarenko. Gaudio, winner of an extraordinary final here in 2004 against compatriot Guillermo Coria, said he felt like quitting earlier this year, but looked on course for a morale-boosting victory on Court Philippe Chatrier as he built a two-set lead.
Fourteenth seed Hewitt gritted his teeth and dug deep, however, and after levelling the match there was only ever going to be one winner. It was the second time in consecutive grand slams he had recovered from a two-set deficit, having also achieved the feat in the first round of his home Australian Open.
Hewitt's next opponent is Finland's Jarkko Nieminen who demolished French wildcard Mathieu Montcourt for the loss of just six games. After the low cloud and drizzle of the opening four days of the tournament, the sun finally came out in the French capital with the promise of an uninterrupted day's play.
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