Rafael Nadal Tested By Marcos Daniel But Makes French Open Second Round

Rafael Nadal has preserved his French Open unbeaten record and progressed to the second round with a challenging victory over world No97 Marcos Daniel. Defeat here would have meant a second consecutive loss on clay for Nadal, a scarcely believable prospect given that the world No1 has won the last four French Opens, the last five Monte Carlo Masters titles and four out of the last five Rome Masters. Daniel's most powerful weapon is his service and he used this to keep the match competitive but in the end Nadal's experience and booming ground strokes were enough to make the next round.

Nadal and Daniel held service for the first eight games before the champion finally broke the Brazilian to go 5-4 up. Daniel broke straight back but then lost his own serve again and Nadal served out for the set.

A determined Daniel then broke Nadal again in the fourth game of the second set, and the Paris crowd responded to this unexpected turn of events. But just as in the first set, Nadal broke straight back to cancel Daniel's advantage, and then held his own serve to make it 3-3 and broke again to take control of the set, which he duly won 6-4.

Daniel's frustration was obvious and his will seemed broken, Nadal pulling away comfortably to take a 5-2 lead in the final set. Daniel summoned up enough energy to break back and then raced to a 40-0 lead on his own service. Once again though Nadal simply upped the pressure, fought back to advantage and then broke to take the match. The Spaniard will now face the winner of the match between Teimuraz Gabashvili and Igor Kunitsyn