Rafael Nadal kicked off his Asian swing with a hard fought 6-4, 6-4, win again Chinese wild card Di Wu.
Nadal is ranked 222 places higher than the Chinese wild card, however, the match was much closer than anticipated for the Spaniard. The 9-time French Open champion was fragile on his serve as he was broken four times in the match.
During the first set, Nadal converted an early break before losing his own serve in the following game. Under pressure from Wu and his home crowd, Nadal managed to generate another break in the seventh game to lead 4-3. Towards the business end there was an upsurge in Nadal’s service levels as he won 8 consecutive points on his serve to close out the opening set.
Despite the convincing end to the first set, Wu was still fighting in the second set, producing some of the best tennis of his career. The encounter turned into a roller-coaster experience for both players with a series of breaks of service. Wu was the first player to consolidate his break to move ahead 3-1. The Spanish player was in trouble as every time he broke Wu, he dropped his own serve in the following game. Nadal finally regained some consistency against an inspired Wu in the eighth game by holding his serve for the first time in the set. After holding that game, the third seed increased his level to break for a chance to serve for the match. With a late resurgence in his form, Nadal took the win with his first match point thanks to the help of an unforced error from Wu.
During the 86-minute match, Nadal produced 22 unforced errors compared to 17 winners. Due to the vulnerability with his serve, Nadal only managed to get 56% of first serves in, winning 67% of them.
Awaiting Nadal in the second round will be Canada’s Vasek Pospisil who defeated Victor Estrella Burgos 4-6, 7-5, 6-0. It will be the first time that Nadal has played the Canadian. Nadal is bidding to win the title for the first time since 2005.
