Last American singles player bows out; Nadal storms on
PARIS — The French Open delivered familiar themes Monday: The last American was excused from the singles draw, and Rafael Nadal looked every bit the dominant king of clay in Paris.
The second-seeded Spaniard steamrolled into the quarterfinals with a 6-2, 6-0, 6-0 victory against 13th-seeded Juan Monaco, running his career record at Roland Garros to 49-1. He has lost a total of 19 games in four matches, the fewest to this point since 1982, when Guillermo Vilas dropped 16. Like Nadal, John McEnroe also made it through four rounds while losing 19 games in the 1984 U.S. Open.
“I feel really comfortable, really at ease,” said Nadal, who is tied with Bjorn Borg with a record six French Open championships.
And American Varvara Lepchenko’s surprising run came to an end with a fourth-round 6-2, 6-1 loss to Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova. It was her most successful major showing.
“I’ve got real mixed feelings right now,” Lepchenko said. “I’m sad, but at the same time, I’m excited.”
When the Uzbekistan native gets back to her new home in Allentown, Pa., she’ll have plenty to look forward to. Helped by her performance in France, she’s projected to move into the top 55 when the next world rankings come out.
-Defending champion Li Na lost 3-6, 6-2, 6-0 to Kazakhstan’s Yaroslava Shvedova, an eyeglass- es-wearing doubles specialist ranked 142nd in singles who needed to qualify to enter the main draw. “I have to find the reason why I lose the match,” said Li, China’s only Grand Slam tournament singles champion. “I will find out. But not today.”
-There are no heartwarming, out-of-nowhere stories like Shvedova’s among the remaining men. It’s the first Grand Slam tournament since the 1984 French Open with all top six seeded men in the quarterfinals.
Nadal will take a 7-0 head-to-head record into an all-Spanish quarterfinal Wednesday against No. 12 Nicolas Almagro, who beat No. 8 Janko Tipsarevic 6-4, 6-4, 6-4.
Britain’s Andy Murray, who was booed by a partisan crowd pulling for France’s Richard Gasquet, ignored a poor start, a still-bothersome back and more taunting and teasing from fans to win 1-6, 6-4, 6-1, 6-2.
Next for Murray is a quarterfinal against No. 6 David Ferrer, who overwhelmed No. 20 Marcel Granollers 6-3, 6-2, 6-0.
In matches halted in progress Sunday because of darkness, No. 5 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga finished off No. 18 Stanislas Wawrinka 6-4, 7-6 (8-6), 3-6, 3-6, 6-4 and No. 9 Juan Martin del Potro defeated No. 7 Tomas Berdych 7-6 (8-6), 1-6, 6-3, 7-5.
Tsonga faces No. 1 Novak Djokovic in a quarterfinal matchup today, and del Potro plays Roger Federer, against whom he is 2-11. One of those wins came in the 2009 U.S. Open final.