Kei Nishikori defeats James Blake; advances to the quarter-final of Delray Beach Championships
Kei Nishikori of Japan defeated American wildcard entrant James Blake in the second round of the Delray Beach International Championships on Wednesday evening. Nishikori qualified for the quarter-finals of the tournament with his
comprehensive straight sets victory by 6-3, 6-4.
The fairly one-sided contest lasted for 64 minutes with the Japanese dominating most of the time. The 21-year-old continues his sublime form at the Delray Beach as he hasn’t lost a set in the tournament.
The Japanese had a flawless baseline defence, backed up by agile footwork. His anticipation was phenomenal as he traced down the occasional drop shots from Blake proficiently. The American lacked shot accuracy and hit plenty of
forehands long and wide.
An aggressive start to the match put Nishikori in early command of the contest. Blake assisted him with his increasing error count. The American pulled off four double-faults in the match and never broke the opponent’s serve.
“He did a good job making a decent amount of first serves, but I wasn’t putting pressure on his second serve,” said Blake after losing the match to Nishikori, “It’s just frustrating because once I got into the point, I felt like
I was hitting the ball well, but he hit the ball great too.”
The opener kicked off very well for Nishikori, who delivered 60 percent of his first serve without committing a double-fault. He converted 15 of 18 first serve points. The Japanese got his first serve break of the match at 3-2.
Nishikori consolidated his lead by his powerful ground strokes and strong defence. His aggressive moves included frequent forays to the net, converting the most of his opportunities. He eventually sealed the opening set of the
match at 6-3.
The Japanese carried on his winning momentum in the next set and clouted a serve break immediate at 1-1. Blake’s game wasn’t strong enough to snatch a break point from his opponent. The American did well on his serve by getting
71 percent of it right and won 15 off 20 first serve points. However, dropping serve to Nishikori early in the set wore him out later.
Nishikori exerted further pressure upon his competitor by his forceful forehand winners and pushed him to make more unforced errors. Blake couldn’t tackle the attacking moves from his rival and succumbed him the second set at 6-4.
The Japanese winner converted 61 of the total 107 points while Blake took 46 winners. Nishikori proved himself a better player than Blake in every segment of the game.
Nishikori books a date with the other American qualifier, Ryan Sweeting in the quarter-finals. Sweeting went past the second round earlier that night, when he outclassed his fellow countryman, third seed Sam Querrey in an exciting
straight set victory 7-6(5), 6-4.
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