Only round three but Nadal is indicating without qualification that he has the means to win the 2012 Australian Open. Two comprehensive displays earned him a free ticket to where he arrived today - an appointment on Rod Laver Arena with Slovakia's Lukas Lacko.
Lacko, ranked in the hundreds, had upset 28th seed Ivan Ljubicic before dumping American Donald Young, but none of that swayed general thought from Nadal swiftly putting an end to his (Lacko's) progress. A fourth round clash with either Isner or Lopez is the first real test for Rafa and the warm up with Lukas would be handy preparation.
The first game of the match unsurprisingly comprised a swift break of serve and Rafa was off and running. The run was only a couple of metres because Lukas caused the number two seed all manner of trouble in the very next game before breaking back for 1-1. Nadal's state of dumbfoundedness lasted until the next change of ends and Lacko led 2-1. Then he noticed that one of his bottles of bottled water had been accidentally shifted a centimetre to the right, causing his tennis game to become accordingly unbalanced. The situation corrected, the umpire allowed the match to proceed.
Five successive games were awarded to Rafa confirming that the world's order had been restored without extensive damage. Nadal 6-2
Rafa reeked a similar type of havoc into the second set, and poor Lukas suffered in outward silence. Surprisingly the turmoil was localised to a single break of serve, but since Rafa banked it early, the rest of the set constituted hitting practice with a paying audience. The exhibition of power shots down the line and retrieval skills in the spirit of the late great Seve Ballesteros almost on their own redeemed value exceeding the ticket cost.
Without being patronising in a deliberate sense, Lukas Lacko played tennis to a standard defying his lowly world ranking, and one should not be shocked to see his name well within the top 100 before much longer.
The third set pretty much turned out to be a friendly finish to the match with Lacko agreeing to play the lacky to the 2009 Aus Open champ, while taking 2 games as a token. The exhibition had been fun, but Rafa was now in the round of sixteen with an appointment at a local knife sharpener - there was serious cut and thrust in the days ahead.
Nadal 6-2 6-4 6-2
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