The world number one played and won his first match back since the Australian Open.
Novak Djokovic is back and in fine form after a tough opening match against his Italian opponent Jannik Sinner beating him in straight sets 6-4, 6-2 in 1 hour and 36 minutes firing 20 winners.
“It feels like playing at home, was a very good encounter, thought it was a great first match, big challenge for me, Jannik ( Sinner) is in form he played finals of Miami and playing well and I just kinda hung in there today and managed to find the right shots and the right game at the right time”
It didn’t take long for sparks to fly and you could sense this match wasn’t going to be as straight forward as people thought. It was the Italian with the first breakpoint of the match at 1-1 and would earn the early break.
The world number responded immediately by breaking right back the very next game to go back on serve at 2-2 and after holding serve broke again to take a 4-2 lead. At 5-3 when serving for the set the Serb faced some trouble and the Italian pounced breaking to once again go back on serve.
Again the world number one would respond by earning two set points on the Italian serve and would convert on the second on take the first set.
The Serb would have the first chance to break in the second set at 2-1 and broke to take an early 3-1 lead. At 4-2 the world number one saved a breakpoint before earning a match point at 5-2 and at the third time of asking the Italian would double fault to end the match.
After the match in his on court interview he gave full credit to his opponent.
“He’s an all-round player, he hits the ball in the sweet spot more or less on any surface really and he’s got a lot of talent and he has proven that he’s the future of our sport, actually he’s already the present of our sport playing finals in Masters already and he’s making big strides in professional tennis”
Djokovic will either face Hubert Hurkacz or Dan Evans in the next round.
In the other matches of the day Filip Krajionovic a fellow Serb beat the lucky loser Juan Ignacio Londero 6-0, 6-3, David Goffin the tournament number 11 seed beat the Italian Marco Cecchinato 6-4, 6-0, Casper Ruud pulled off the upset of the day beating Diego Schwartzman the number 7 seed 6-3, 6-3.
Christian Garin beat the Aussie John Millman 6-1, 6-4, Andrey Rublev beat another Italian Salvatore Caruso 6-3, 6-2, Grigor Dimitrov beat the Frenchman Jeremy Chardy 7-6(3), 6-4, and Fabio Fognini beat another Aussie in Jordan Thompson 6-3, 6-3.
