Nadal hot in pursuit of a feat of clay
WORLD NO. 1 RUTHLESS AGAINST CHILDHOOD FRIEND GASQUET
Rafael Nadal, a 10time champion, defeated childhood friend Richard Gasquet for the 16th time as Maria Sharapova marked her first appearance on Court Philippe Chatrier in three years with a 6-2, 6-1 rout of Karolina Pliskova to set-up a potential French Open last-16 duel with nemesis Serena Williams yesterday.
Nadal continued his bid for an 11th French Open title by brushing aside Gasquet to claim a 16th consecutive win over his childhood friend.
The world number one’s record at Roland Garros now stands at 82 wins and just two losses. The 16-time Grand Slam champion eased to a 6-3, 6-2, 6-2 victory on Chatrier.
The 31-year-old also took his run of consecutive completed sets at the French Open to 34, just seven shy of the record held by Bjorn Borg between 1979 and 1981.
There was a sense of inevitability about the outcome when both players made their appearance on Court Philippe Chatrier, where Nadal is the huge favourite to lift the Musketeers Cup for a record-extending 11th time.
“I played very well, I’m sorry for Richard, he is a good friend and a good person,” said Nadal, who played a few rallies with a ball boy after his match.
He has now won 30 sets in a row on the Parisian red dust and his last-16 opponent, 70th ranked 22-year-old German Maximilian Marterer, does not exactly seem equipped to cope with the Mallorcan’s range of weapons.
Gasquet was totally overwhelmed on Saturday, finding himself trailing 5-0 after 12 minutes, and the Parisian crowd felt it could be an express washout.
Local hope crushed
In a bid to give the home fans something to shout about, Gasquet spurred himself into action and with a few beautiful shots reduced the gap to 5-3.
But Nadal was in no mood for a marathon and he bagged the first set on serve before putting Gasquet to the sword again at the beginning of the second and third sets, making sure there was no hope of a comeback amongst the Frenchman’s supporters.
Nadal, who lost only two points in the first five games, will next play Germany’s world number 70 Maximilian Marterer, who beat Estonian lucky loser Jurgen Zopp.
Former champion Garbine Muguruza reached the last 16 for the fifth successive year with a comfortable 6-0, 6-2 win over Australia’s Sam Stosur.
Spanish third seed Muguruza, the 2016 winner in Paris and the reigning Wimbledon champion, fired 15 winners past Stosur, the 34-year-old 2010 runner-up and former US Open champion.
“I knew this would be very tough against a former US Open winner and a player who has made the final here,” said 24-year-old Muguruza. “If I didn’t play my best tennis, I realised that it would be very hard.”
The Spaniard goes on to face Lesia Tsurenko of Ukraine who knocked out Slovakian 19th seed Magdalena Rybarikova 6-2, 6-4.
Estonian 25th seed Anett Kontaveit made the last 16 for the first time by downing Czech eighth seed Petra Kvitova who saw her 13-match win streak end in a horror show of 57 unforced errors.
Kontaveit next faces US Open champion Sloane Stephens, the American 10th seed, who saw off Italy’s Camila Giorgi 4-6, 6-1, 8-6.
Italy’s Fabio Fognini made the last 16 for the second time with a 6-3, 4-6, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 win over Britain’s last man standing Kyle Edmund. Fognini joins compatriot Marco Cecchinato in the fourth round, the first time that more than one Italian has made the last 16 since 1976.