Nadal overpowers Busta in Doha

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  • Strong start: Nadal hit 30 winners during his three-set win against Pablo Carreno Busta.

    A year after suffering a shock exit to Michael Berrer in the first round in Doha, Rafael Nadal returned to the very same court and kicked off his 2016 campaign with an “important victory” against fellow Spaniard Pablo Carreno Busta on Tuesday night.

    The world No5 came back from a set down to defeat the 24-year-old Carreno Busta 6-7 (5), 6-3, 6-1 in exactly two hours to book a Qatar Open second round meeting with Dutchman Robin Haase.

    Nadal finished the match with an impressive 30 winners tally against 25 unforced errors and was pleased with how he navigated the tough change in conditions between the warm temperatures in Abu Dhabi last weekend, and the colder, windier weather in Doha.

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    “The most important thing for me is I managed to find the good way to play good tennis, no?” Nadal said at the Khalifa International Tennis and Squash Complex. 

    “Starting the season with victory is so important. Well, the negative thing is the conditions changed a lot from here to Abu Dhabi. 

    “Abu Dhabi was much more hot and here is colder and has been so windy. I couldn’t practice the way I needed to adapt. So was a big change in terms of ball feeling on court.

    “You can see David (Ferrer) had a tough day today, too. So the conditions are not easy.”

    Stepping on centre court moments after his countryman, the defending champion, David Ferrer was sent packing by Illya Marchenko, Nadal knew he had to adjust his play to the tricky Doha conditions.

    Both Nadal and Carreno Busta made strong starts, striking the ball well from the back of the court as the opening set remained on serve all the way to a tiebreak, with no break points faced.

    In the breaker, the younger Spaniard, ranked 67 in the world, raced to a 6-2 lead and even though Nadal saved three consecutive set points, the No2 seed faltered on the fourth to give his opponent a one-set advantage.

    But Nadal was unperturbed, and soon earned his first break of the match in the third game of the second set with a great cross court backhand and he broke again in game nine to level the clash.

    In the decider, the players traded breaks early on but Nadal ran away with the last four games to take his record against the Spanish upstart to 2-0 head-to-head.

    “I think I changed a little bit at the beginning of the second (set). I played with a little bit higher intensity and being a little bit more 
    aggressive, going a little bit more for the shots. 

    “When I was able to make that happen, everything changed, no?” explained Nadal.

    “So I’m very happy the way that I managed to change the dynamic of the match, and I think I finished the match playing well.”

    Earlier in the day, third-seeded Tomas Berdych took his record against Sergiy Stakhovsky to 7-0 as he eased past the Ukrainian 7-5, 6-4 to make the second round.

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