Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic strolled past their respective opponents to reach the second round at Wimbledon on Tuesday.
Nadal, who hasn’t reached a Wimbledon final since 2011, took just under two hours to get past Dudi Sela in straight sets. The first seven games of the match went to serve, until Nadal broke in the eighth game to seize control of the set to take it 6-4.
Nadal took the momentum into the second as he broke serve in the very first game. The French Open champion never looked back and broke again in the ninth to take the second set 6-3.
Nadal had a bit of a hiccup by dropping the first game of the third, but he was back to his ruthless self and broke Sela three times to win the match 6-4, 6-3, 6-3 to book his place in the second round.
Later in the day, another three-time champion Novak Djokovic also had an easy victory after defeating Tennys Sandgren 6-3, 6-1, 6-2. Djokovic broke Sandgren’s serve seven times and only lost his own serve once as it took him just 96 minutes to progress to the second round.
In the women’s singles, world No 1 Simona Halep had to work harder than anticipated to defeat Kurumi Nara of Japan. The Roland-Garros champion started superbly by breaking in the very first game and holding her serve to love. In the fourth game, she dropped her serve, before winning four consecutive games to take the first set 6-2.
Halep broke Nara’s serve in the very first game of the second set and held serve the next game to take a 2-0 lead. Halep had to save a couple of break-points in the fourth game, but after that, the rest of set went to serve as Halep booked her spot in the second round with a 6-2, 6-4 victory.
Maria Sharapova did not have the best of days as she crashed out in the first round after losing to fellow Russian, Vitalia Diatchenko, in three sets. Both women broke their opponent three times in the first set but it was Sharapova who took it in a tie-break.
Sharapova looked to have been on course for an easy victory after breaking to take a 3-0 lead early in the second. But while serving for the match she lost serve and the second also went to a tie-breaker. Diatchenko prevailed to level the match at one set all.
The deciding set saw five breaks of serve. Firstly, Sharapova broke in the third game, but she gave up a break of her own in the very next game. That very same scenario repeated itself in the seventh and eight games. The fifth and most important break of the set came in the 10th game as Diatchenko broke Sharapova for the third time in the set to book her spot in the second round with a 6-7 (3), 7-6 (3) 6-4 victory.
Other selected men’s results:
Marcos Baghdatis defeated Dominic Thiem 6-4, 7-5, 2-0 (Retired)
Nick Kyrgios defeated Denis Istomin7-6 (3), 7-6 (4), 6-7 (5), 6-3
Denis Shapovalov defeated Jeremy Chardy 6-3, 3-6, 7-5, 6-4
Diego Schwartzman defeated Mirza Basic 603, 6-2, 6-1
Other selected women’s results:
Garbine Muguruza defeated Naomi Broady 6-2, 7-5
Jelena Ostapenko defeated Katy Dunne 6-3, 7-6 (5)
Aliaksandra Sasnovich defeated Petra Kvitova6-4, 4-6, 6-0
Angelique Kerber defeated Vera Zvonareva 7-5, 6-3
Photo: Wimbeldon.com
