Rafael Nadal knocks out Julien Benneteau in the second round – Western & Southern Open 2011
World number 2 Rafael Nadal of Spain came back to winning ways as he beat French qualifier Julien Benneteau, ranked 112th in the world, in straight sets 6-4, 7-5 in the second round at the Western and Southern Open in
Cincinnati on Wednesday. The Spaniard took only an hour and 32 minutes to beat the French in a one-sided match.
Nadal broke Benneteau in the seventh game of the first set and consolidated on it to grab a 5-3 lead. The left-hander served out the opening set at 5-4.
The Spaniard served exceptionally well as he kept his first serve percentage at 70 percent and fired an incredible six aces in the first set. The 25-year-old captured fifteen of the sixteen first service points and five of the
seven second service points. In comparison, Benneteau could not serve that well as he delivered a meagre 44 percent of the first serves and committed a couple of double faults in the opening set. The French failed to save the only break point he faced and
bagged just one of the sixteen first return points in the first set.
In a similar fashion to the opening set, Nadal drew the first blood in the second set, breaking Benneteau in the fifth game and holding his serve in the next game to build a 4-2 lead. However, this time he failed to serve out the
set at 5-4, losing his serve to level the score at 5-5. The six feet and one inch tall broke again in the eleventh game and won his next service game to capture the set 7-5.
In the second set, the Spaniard could not serve at the same level as he served in the first set. Still, he hit three aces and converted fourteen of the eighteen first serves into points in the second set.
Nadal said, after the match, "My serve worked well today; my forehand for almost all the time I hit very good shots. I did a lot of things well, but not in every point. I played three points well; after I played two points bad. So
I am in the right way, but I need to keep having matches. For sure that's important for me now."
The Spaniard faced a surprise loss at the hands of Croatian Ivan Dodig in his opening match at the Rogers Cup last week.
The Mallorca resident admitted, "The moments that I spend one week ago in Montreal when I lost the match, serving for the match, always the confidence goes down a little bit after one match like that. So that probably affected
me a little bit today with 5-4 and the serve.”
Nadal will meet world number 21, compatriot Fernando Verdasco in the round of 16.
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