Rafa Nadal demolishes opponent 6-0,6-1,6-0 en-route third round win at French Open
Rafael Nadal game reached near immortal heights once again that have made him nothing short of a living legend at Roland Garros. Nadal who turns 31 today couldn’t have given himself a better birthday gift a 6-0,6-1,6-0 drubbing of World No. 63 Nicolaz Basilashvili.
La Decima in Sights
Rafael Nadal has raked up a staggering 9 trophies in Paris losing just twice in the last 11 years on the red dirt. ‘I think I played great,’ he said. ‘At the beginning of the match, in my opinion my opponent was not playing bad, and I was able to produce winners, to play with no mistakes, to play very long. Very high intensity in all the shots.’
This was Nadal’s 100th best-of-five set match on clay, and he has won 98.
The question soon became how long would it take Basilashvili to win a single game and, then, whether Nadal could pull off the miracle triple bagel.
He wrapped up the first set inside 25 breathless minutes. At the start of the second set Basilashvili began by forgetting to signal that he was serving with new balls. It is fair to say he had bigger things to worry about as Nadal showed no signs of letting up on his assault.
At 0-6, 0-5 down, Basilashvili finally held serve and received generous, if slightly patronising, applause from the Chatrier crowd.
