By Chris Oddo Photo Credit: Patrick Kovarik/ Getty/ AFP
(May 31, 2012)—For all of the first set it looked like Andy Murray’s French Open was about to come to an abrupt end. He couldn’t move and no matter what the trainers did to Murray’s ailing back it seemed that things were getting worse.
His opponent, 30-year-old Fin Jarkko Nieminen, seemed more than happy to take advantage. In a lopsided first set that saw Murray reach for his lower back in agony more than he reached for the ball, Nieminen took an early lead.
Murray looked to be on the brink of retirement, down a break in the second, but suddenly his form began to improve.
First he started to move, then he started to swing. He was still down a break, but the difference was obvious.
After leveling the set at 4-4, Murray, whose back had apparently loosened up, reeled off the last two games of the set to draw even at 1-1, and he never looked back.
After a set and a half of barely being able to summon the power to hit a second serve, Murray was suddenly back to his old self, thumping his serve, covering the court like a gazelle and hitting his patented backhand with trademark pluckiness.
Meanwhile, Nieminen was looking confused. He sprayed 30 errors in the final two sets as Murray continued to stay on point, breaking twice in set three and another two times in the final set to win comfortably 1-6, 6-4, 6-1, 6-2.
It was a remarkable turnaround for Murray, one that certainly came as a surprise to those who witnessed him in a state of panic in the early going, seemingly a point or two away from throwing in the towel.
Murray has now reached the French Open's third round a fifth consecutive time. He will take on Colombian Santiago Giraldo for a spot in the round of 16. Giraldo upended the youngest player in the draw, 19-year-old No. 25 seed Bernard Tomic, 6-4, 6-1, 6-3 earlier today.
Nadal Ruthless Against Istomin in One-Sided Victory
It was all one-way traffic for the six-time French Open champion today, as Nadal made short work of Denis Istomin, 6-2, 6-2, 6-0. Nadal has only lost nine games in two matches thus far in Paris, and he brushed aside both break points he faced in the second set before reeling off ten consecutive games to finish off the shell-shocked Istomin.
Nadal's French Open record now stands at 47-1.
"I'm happy," said Nadal. "First match was a little bit more crazy because Bolelli tried to hit every ball very hard, it was a match without rhythm, but today it was a little bit more normal match."
In the final set, the relentless Spaniard raised his game—and the bar for those hoping to keep him from rewriting tennis history in Paris—further. The relentless Spaniard made11 of 12 first serves and didn't lose a single point on serve in the set.
Yet true to form, nit-picky Nadal found fault in his game. "I think the only thing that I am not very happy about today was my serve," said Nadal. "At the end I served a little bit better but at the beginning it was a very low percentage of serves, so that's the thing that I have to keep working on."
If Nadal can do anything to improve on what was a sparkling, dominant performance it's definitely bad news for the rest of the field.
In other action, fifth-seeded Jo-Wilfried Tsonga lifted the hearts of the French faithful, when he finished off German Cedric-Marcel Stebe in four sets 6-2, 4-6, 6-2, 6-1 in a match that was suspended on Wednesday after two sets.
Ferrer d. Paire, 6-3, 6-3, 6-4
The two-time French Open quarterfinalist converted on 7 of 20 break point opportunities to defeat the world No. 69. Paire, 23, committed 51 unforced errors to Ferrer's 17. Ferrer will face 27th-seeded Mikhail Youzhny in the third round.
Raonic d. Levine, 6-4, 7-5, 6-2
The hard-serving 19th-seeded Canadian had never won a French Open match before 2012, but his 16-ace performance against American qualifier Jesse Levine gives him two wins on the week. Raonic, who only lost five points on his first serve and broke Levine five times, will face a huge challenge in the third round when he takes on clay-court guru Juan Monaco.