Rafael Nadal, who has marked his 1,000th match since starting his ATP career, defeated German Philipp Kohlschreiber 0-6, 6-2 and 6-3 in the third round to advance in the Masters 1000 tournament here. Nadal won his 14th match against Kohlschreiber on Sunday, Germany’s second best player after Alexander Zverev, reports Efe.
The first set, however, scared Nadal’s fans, who seemed bewildered by what was happening on the court. Kohlschreiber came out swinging in the first set, smashing the ball with all his soul, to which Nadal seemed unable to respond. The first 25-minute set finished with a resounding 6-0.
Nadal seemed unusually out of sorts, hitting balls on the frame of the racket over six times. In this first set, Nadal scored only 13 points and won 33 per cent of his serves while Kohlschreiber won about 90 per cent.
After being bageled for 1st time since 2015 @AustralianOpen, @RafaelNadal rallies for 06 62 63 victory over @Kohlscribbler in #MiamiOpen 4R.
— ATP Media Info (@ATPMediaInfo) March 26, 2017
Only 10 players have been able to achieve a 6-0 against Nadal throughout his entire career, the last one was Czech Tomas Berdych during the 2015 Australian Open, where he defeated Nadal 6-2, 6-0 and 7-6(5). Nadal became the eleventh player in ATP tournament history to achieve the 1,000 match milestone in his career.
On the list are two other active players, Swiss Roger Federer (1,340) and also Spain’s David Ferrer (1,034), as well as retired Argentine Guillermo Vilas. Nadal left the court after the first set and returned as a different player. In the second set, he brought back his usual furious racket, winning the important points and showing great ability to smash the balls.
Kohlschreiber won the first two games. However, the rest of the match did not look so good to him. Nadal broke the serve of Kohlschreiber and reached 2-0. The German then hardly put up resistance to Nadal and no longer had break balls to try and stop the Spaniard. Nadal will play his next match against French player Nicolas Mahut.
