DJOKOVIC FENDS OFF NADAL-SLAYER VERDASCO
MELBOURNE: Novak Djokovic may have cursed the draw for throwing up Fernando Verdasco as the first opponent in his Australian Open defence on Tuesday but the tough match-up against the Spanish giantkiller ultimately proved a blessing in disguise.
The Serb launched his bid for a record seventh title at Melbourne Park with an impressive 6-1, 7-6(4), 6-2 win over the man who knocked Rafa Nadal out in the first round of last year’s tournament.
Djokovic was forced to save five match points to beat Verdasco at the recent Qatar Open and was broken twice during a thrilling second set under the lights of Rod Laver Arena.
But the second seed defended brilliantly to defuse the veteran left hander’s power game and closed out the two-hour 20-minute clash.
“I knew that winning the second set would be crucial because I definitely didn’t want to give him wings,” Djokovic told reporters after setting up a second round clash against Uzbek Denis Istomin.
“I didn’t want to have him start swinging at the ball, as he knows.
“I don’t know how he felt about the draw. But I personally think that I could have drawn... an easier player. But nothing is easy obviously.”
RADWANSKA PREVAILS Poland’s Agnieszka Radwanska survived a dogfight to move into the second round on Tuesday as she bids to end her long wait for a maiden Grand Slam title.
The third seed battled past fellow veteran, Bulgarian Tsvetana Pironkova, 6-1, 4-6, 6-1 and will next play Croat Mirjana Lucic-Baroni, who beat Chinese qualifier Wang Qiang in three sets.
“I have played her (Pironkova) many times and knew she was good,” said the 27-year-old.
“I’m very happy that I was able to come back strongly in the third set and pleased to be into the next round.”
84-GAME MARATHON Ivo Karlovic smashed a jawdropping 75 aces as he beat Horacio Zeballos in a record, 84-game marathon which stretched more than five hours.
The Croatian serving specialist yelled in delight and pranced around the court as he finally sealed victory 6-7 (6/8), 3-6, 7-5, 6-2, 22-20 on an outer court at Melbourne Park.
The match beat the Australian Open’s previous tiebreak-era record of 83 games, set in Andy Roddick’s defeat of Younes El Aynaoui in 2003.
At five hours 15 minutes, it was one of the longest matches in the tournament’s history, although still short of the five hours, 53 minutes set in the 2012 men’s final.
The denouement, when it finally came, was almost comical as an exhausted Karlovic chipped a hopeful lob over Zeballos, only for the Argentine to send a wayward forehand rocketing out of the court.
The 6ft 11ins (2.11m) Karlovic already holds the record for aces on tour after surpassing Goran Ivanisevic’s career 2015.
In other matches, Caroline Wozniacki left behind White House memories to halt her slide.
Since her invites to the White House is likely to dry up once outgoing US President Barack Obama vacates the premises this week, Wozniacki was relieved to snap her backward sliding run following her 6-1 6-2 first-round rout over local hope Arina Rodionova.
After tweeting a picture of herself with Obama with the message “Thank you Mr President!... I’ll miss playing tennis with you at the White House”, the former world number one was relieved that she finally bucked a worrying trend at the Australian Open. RAONIC DUSTS OFF BROWN Milos Raonic was not going to be too effusive after his first round victory over Germany’s Dustin Brown because as far as he was concerned he did what he needed to do.
The Canadian third seed wasted little time in dispatching the enigmatic dreadlocked German 6-3 6-4 6-2 in 93 minutes on Margaret Court Arena, with a powerful service game.
Raonic, a semifinalist at Melbourne Park last year, broke Brown once in each of the first two sets and then twice in the third. He also fired down 18 aces and another 20 unreturned serves. “It was what it needed to be,” Raonic matter-of-factly told reporters of his performance. “It’s obviously tough to have necessarily a solid performance all the way through, but I did what I needed to.”
“I took care of my serve. I broke quite early in all the sets. I returned pretty solid when I had to. I stepped up, and I played well.” HEALTHY NADAL ADVANCES
Rafael Nadal powered into the second round with a commanding straight-set win over Germany’s Florian Mayer on Tuesday.
The 14-time Grand Slam champion looked back to his healthy best after an injury-riddled 2016 as he beat the 49th-ranked Mayer 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 in just over two hours on Rod Laver Arena.
He will next play Cypriot Marcos Baghdatis in the second round. total of 10,237 in