SHANGHAI: And the day finally came. The two superstars of the Shanghai Rolex Masters made their official debut in the tournament, after days of teasing the fans with promotional appearances, funny dances with Disney characters and training sessions on a Court 5 bursting at the seams with people, always surrounded by dozens of armed guards to maintain order.
Tennis in China is mainly based on the star power of some of its main characters, and Roger and Rafa are the brightest stars of all, just what the doctor ordered for a very ambitious tournament with the lowest attendance figures of all the Masters 1000. Scheduled one after the other in the evening session, they took the court about an hour late, just before 7pm, owing to the puzzling decision by the tournament to move Simon-Goffin to Center Court after rain had severely disrupted play on side courts. It wasn’t difficult to predict a long match between the Frenchmen and the Belgian, but they were given the honor of the retractable-roofed Qizhong Arena to fill the gap after Aljaz Bedene retired just four games into his second round match with Sascha Zverev.
The show opener was Nadal, who disposed with ruthless efficiency of the young Jared Donaldson, who managed to keep his tidy tennis composed until 2-2 and then got merciless routed with the score of 6-2, 6-1. “Well, was a very quick match in all aspects – said Rafa in his press conference – I think Jared started playing very well at the beginning, serving big, and then hitting very strong from the baseline, no? But of course I was happy to have that break in the 3-2 in the sixth game. Helps me that he made some double faults, two double faults. Then I played some good points, I think. After that I think I played a great match. Not many mistakes. Playing very aggressive with the backhand/forehand. My serve worked well. I don’t know the percentage, but probably was high. And when I was serving, the second serve was a big second serve too, no? Happy with everything. For me it was difficult to imagine a better start.”
Federer’s tough start
Right after that, Roger Federer made his appearance in front of a finally-crowded arena where choreographies had been prepared for him: “It feels great to get support – the Swiss commented after the match – have played in so many different atmospheres around the world. I feel like I can handle anything. Plus, if they are on my side, you know, and cheering for me, I feel it only helps me. I thought the flag was awesome. It was great. It was big. They were all just the same, all had the same banners. You can tell that there was a lot of effort put into it. Also tried to sit all together. I think that’s a lot of fun for me, as a player, to see that, because usually you only see that with sort of soccer clubs or team sports. Individual sports, for fans to get together, is rare.”
His second round match with Argentinian Diego Schwartzmann was no picnic: the diminutive man was coming from a good string of results, including the semifinals in Tokyo last week, and gave the the Swiss master a good run for his money: “Yeah, tough match. You know, I knew going in it was not going to be easy. He’s had a great run in recent weeks and months. I really felt that he was confident, you know. Shaking off misses, no problem. He was serving well. You could see he was taking the right decisions, you know, on his groundstrokes.And as an opponent, you feel that. You could see there was a sort of an ease about his game today. I felt like that was going to be dangerous down the stretch of any set. I felt that tiebreaker was tough. I was down and then came up with some really good shot-making after that in the breaker to really turn it around.”
Federer lost an early break in mid first-set but could turn it around in the tie-break and cruise to the third round with an easier second round. Eventually winning 7-6(4), 6-4.
The two superstars will repeat the double-header on Thursday evening, when Rafael Nadal will meet humoral Italian Fabio Fognini, who has already defeated him in three out of the previous 12 encounters, while Federer will have to stave off the talented game of Dolgopolov.
