Nadal Holds Off Haas; Del Potro Advances

© Getty ImagesJuan Martin del Potro is a former Aussie Open quarter-finalist.

Current World No. 2 Rafael Nadal held off former World No. 2 Tommy Haas 6-4, 6-3, 6-4 on Wednesday afternoon to secure his place in the Australian Open third round.

Nadal appeared in control to start the match as he raced out to a 4-0 lead, but Haas came close to levelling the score with a break point chance in the tenth game before the Spaniard fought back to claim the first set.

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Haas, a three-time Melbourne semi-finalist, challenged the 2009 champion once again as he opened the third set with a break. His hopes of forcing a set off of Nadal for the first time in five meetings were extinguished, though, as the Spaniard responded with two breaks, clinching the two-hour, 29-minute decision on Haas’ serve.

"I had a very bad game in the beginning of the third," admitted Nadal. "After that, the set is in trouble. If you don't have the break back next game, you will be fighting all the set to try to come back. Finally I did. 

"I think he played well. He played aggressive. He played with very good second serves. For moments, his first serve was really difficult to read. I think he played well."

Haas, the oldest player in the men's draw at 33 years of age, was pleased with his performance, taking into consideration his lack of match play due to injury over the past couple years.

"Just a few points here and there that could have gone a little bit differently, who knows if one of those sets could have been mine," he said. "Overall I'm pretty happy with the way I played at times.

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"There is still a lot of room to improve and be more consistent. I still feel like I'm lacking the experience of matches because it hasn't been really that many in the last almost two years now. That hurt me a little bit going into such a big match. I really enjoyed it and gave it all I have. I can't complain about that."

Another former Grand Slam champion, Juan Martin del Potro, also advanced Wednesday with a 6-4, 7-5, 6-3 win over Slovenian Blaz Kavcic. The World No. 11 was unable to save the three break points he faced on serve, but went seven for 12 on his opportunties to close out the two-hour, 42-minute victory.

"[I'm] almost in my best form," said the Argentine. "I think I played much better than my first match, and Kavcic is very dangerous and [much] faster, so I know I should play 100 per cent like today. I feel confidence with my forehand basically."

Del Potro advances to the Australian Open third round for the third time in four years. He achieved his best Melbourne result by reaching the quarter-finals in 2009 (l. to Federer), the same season he went on to capture the US Open title (d. Federer).

The 23 year old next confronts Chinese Taipei’s Yen-Hsun Lu, currently No. 79 in the South African Airways ATP Rankings. Lu defeated Frenchman Florent Serra 7-5, 6-2, 6-2 earlier in the day.