Rafael Nadal made a dominant return to tennis after a two-month injury layoff, beating Richard Gasquet 6-4, 6-0 in 78 minutes at the China Open yesterday.
Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray also advanced to the second round in Beijing, but in vastly different fashion. The top-ranked Djokovic improved to 20-0 at the China Open with a routine 6-2, 6-1 win over Spain’s Guillermo Garcia-Lopez, while Murray battled for 2.5 hours to put away Poland’s Jerzy Janowicz 6-7 (9), 6-4, 6-2.
Nadal had not played a match since his surprising fourth-round exit at Wimbledon to Australian teenager Nick Kyrgios. The 14-time major winner withdrew from the US Open, citing a right-wrist injury, but he never looked in trouble against Gasquet, a semi-finalist at the 2013 US Open who has slumped to 22nd in the rankings this year.
Photo: AFP
In the women’s action, WTA Finals qualifiers Maria Sharapova and Simona Halep recorded straight-sets victories yesterday, but Singapore hopefuls Eugenie Bouchard and Agnieszka Radwanska were dumped out in second-round upsets.
Bouchard, who lost in the final of last week’s Wuhan Open, was beaten by unseeded German Sabine Lisicki 6-2 6-4, while Italian Roberta Vinci knocked out 2011 winner Radwanska 6-4 6-4.
The defeats left the Polish world No. 6 and seventh-ranked Bouchard waiting to book a qualifying spot at next month’s WTA’s season-ending championships in Singapore.
Photo: AFP
Russian Sharapova produced some bruising groundstrokes as she crushed Ukrainian Elina Svitolina 6-2 6-2, while Romanian Halep had some issues before overcoming Chinese wildcard Zhu Lin 7-5 6-4.
World No. 4 Sharapova now faces a third-round meeting with Spain’s Carla Suarez Navarro. Halep’s win set up a clash with 15th seed Andrea Petkovic, the German having little trouble in ousting the US’ Madison Keys 6-2 6-3.
Former world number one Ana Ivanovic was another second round winner as she beat Swiss Romina Oprandi 6-4 6-2 on the Moon Court.
Venus Williams also advanced with a 6-4 6-3 victory over France’s Caroline Garcia, while 13th-ranked Czech Lucie Safarova beat German Mona Barthel 6-3 6-3.
Later, Venus’ sister Serena Williams cruised to a 6-2, 6-3 win over Bulgarian Tsvetana Pironkova.
Freddie Freeman homered and drove in four runs, Shohei Ohtani also went deep and Roki Sasaki earned his first major league win as the Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Atlanta Braves 10-3 on Saturday night for their seventh straight victory. The Dodgers have won the first two games of the series to improve to 5-0 against Atlanta this year. Los Angeles’ three-game sweep at home early in the season left the Braves 0-7. Sasaki allowed three runs and six hits over five innings. The 23-year-old right-hander gave up a home run to Ozzie Albies, but received plenty of offensive support in his
Bayern Munich on Sunday were crowned German champions for the 34th time, giving striker Harry Kane his first major trophy, after second-placed Bayer 04 Leverkusen drew 2-2 at SC Freiburg. Bayern’s 3-3 draw at RB Leipzig on Saturday, when the Bavarians came from two goals down to take the lead before conceding a stoppage-time equalizer, meant defending Bundesliga champions Leverkusen needed to win at Freiburg to delay the title party. Leverkusen were two goals down before scoring twice in the final 10 minutes, but Xabi Alonso’s side could not find a third, as Bayern reclaimed the title at the first attempt after
Shuttler Lin Chun-yi yesterday kept Taiwan on the board as they faced their first major challenge of the group stage after marching into the last eight at the Sudirman Cup Finals in Xiamen, China. Taiwan were losing 3-1 to South Korea as of press time last night, with only the men’s doubles match remaining. Taiwan and four-time champions South Korea have already progressed to the quarter-finals, after Taiwan on Monday blanked the Czech Republic 5-0 without giving up a single game. Before last night’s tie, Taiwan were undefeated in Group B, with a 9-1 match record, ahead of South Korea, who, although also
A man fell from the 6.4m-high Clemente Wall in right field at PNC Park in Pittsburgh during Wednesday night’s game between the Pirates and the Chicago Cubs. Right after Andrew McCutchen hit a two-run double in the seventh inning to put the Pirates ahead 4-3, players began waving frantically for medical personnel and pointing to the man, who had fallen onto the warning track. The fan was tended to for approximately five minutes by members of both the Pirates and Cubs training staffs as well as PNC personnel before being removed from the field on a cart. The team issued a statement shortly
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