Nick Kyrgios made light work of Fabio Fognini as he progressed serenely into the 4th Round of the Miami Open, 6-3 6-3 in just 66 minutes.
The contest between the two most mercurial talents in the game today rarely lived up to its billing as the Italian failed to match the powerful Australian off the ground, or find an answer to his imposing serve.
Kyrgios, who has recently returned to the game following an elbow injury after the Australian Open, broke the Italian’s serve immediately as Fognini sent a forehand long for a 2-0 lead, and duly held on to take the opening set in 29 minutes 6-3.
Although Fognini managed to hold onto his opening service game, saving a break point in the process, he dropped serve in his next service game when Kyrgios’s thunderous backhand cross-court drive forced the error from the Italian.
Kyrgios was rarely troubled on serve and never faced a break point as he went on to take the match, courtesy of a second break of the Fognini serve with a backhand return up the line which forced the error from the Italian on the forehand wing at full stretch.
“I came into the tournament not really expecting too much, struggling with injury”, Kyrgios admitted. “Before the tournament started I was having back spasms, and so being nowhere close to 100 percent and still beating these guys is a big confidence booster for me. Honestly, I would say I’m probably at around 70 percent. To be serving this well and be performing like this is pretty good. I’m not really worrying about how they are playing, I’m just trying to get through these matches without my body letting me down. Just trying to take things slowly.”
A dejected Fognini described the match as one of the worst he has ever played: “I think I played really badly, so no excuses”, he said. “Playing against him is really difficult because he is really good and you don’t get a lot of rallies. I played bad. That’s it.”
“He’s one of the best players in the world with this serve. Even though I didn’t have a break point, I was always on 30 or on deuce sometimes. Especially from the baseline I was feeling really bad. Was too easy for him to play today.”
Kyrgios, who served 9 aces and converted 3 out of 5 break point chances, will face the winner of Alexander Zverev versus David Ferrer.
