Top seed Rafael Nadal overcame some uncharacteristic nerves to surge into the quarter-finals of the Argentina Open on Wednesday with an efficient 6-4, 6-0 victory over Argentine qualifier Facundo Arguello.
Nadal, ranked fourth in the world, needed just 1 hour, 4 minutes to win his opening match in the clay-court tournament, booking a clash with Federico Delbonis.
The Spaniard’s 714th career win gave him sole possession of 10th on the all-time list in the Open Era, ahead of Boris Becker.
Photo: Reuters
Nadal admitted he felt a few nerves opening his Buenos Aires campaign after a semi-final loss to Italian Fabio Fognini at the Rio Open last week.
“It’s never easy to open when you have lost a match like the one I lost in Rio de Janeiro,” the Spaniard said.
“I started a little nervous and Arguello played very well in the first set. In the second, I felt more comfortable and I was able to attack more,” he said.
Nadal’s defeat to Fognini — which ended a run of 52 consecutive semi-final clay-court wins stretching back 12 years — saw the Spaniard drop from third to fourth in the world, the first time he has not figured in the top three since August 2013.
This week he is trying to reassert his dominance on clay. He is one clay-court title away from Guillermo Vilas’ record of 46 triumphs on the surface.
Delbonis, in a rematch of last year’s Sao Paulo final, once again triumphed over Italian Paolo Lorenzi with a 6-4, 6-2 win.
Third seed Pablo Cuevas reached his third straight quarter-final with a 7-6 (7/4), 6-1 victory over Guido Andreozzi.
Cuevas produced seven aces to beat the local wild card. He will next face hometown favorite Juan Monaco, who upset fellow Argentine and fifth seed Leonardo Mayer 6-4, 6-4.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB