Nadal opens clay season with easy victory

Back on his favourite surface, Rafael Nadal showed no lingering effects of a recent injury as he breezed into the third round of the Monte Carlo Masters with a 6-1, 6-1 win against Roberto Bautista Agut.

Nadal was making his season debut on clay and playing his first match since suffering a knee injury at Indian Wells one month ago , but the defending champion looked sharp from the start and secured an early break of serve for 2-0.

Aside from having to save five break points across two games – at 0-40 down in the fourth game and at 15-40 in the sixth- Nadal was otherwise untroubled by his fellow Spaniard.

The 17-time Grand Slam champion converted his first match point when he met his opponent’s strong forehand with a crisp volley at the net.

Nadal is looking to win the clay-court tournament for a record-extending 12th time and next plays Grigor Dimitrov, whom he has beaten 11 times in 12 matches.

Third-seeded Alexander Zverev, world No. 6 Stefanos Tsitsipas, No. 10 Daniil Medvedev, and No. 13 Fabio Fognini also advanced to the third round Wednesday.

But Japanese world No. 5 Kei Nishikori, who lost to Nadal in last year’s final, was beaten by Pierre-Hugues Herbert 7-5 6-4.

Zverev won 6-1 6-4 against Felix Auger-Aliassime, breaking the 18-year-old Canadian’s serve six times.

Tsitsipas beat Mikhail Kukushkin 6-3 7-5 and next faces Medvedev.

The Russian beat Radu Albot 6-1 6-2, while Fognini had a walkover after Gilles Simon pulled out with a back injury and next takes on Zverev.

There were also second-round wins for Dimitrov, Taylor Fritz and Cameron Norrie.

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