Wawrinka's defence on track

Stanislas Wawrinka has done well in his defence of the Aus Open crown thus far and he could expect some fight from Finland's Jarkko Nieminen in the third round but anything other than a straight sets win would be considered less than acceptable based on form and capacity.
If Stan could serve well then the chances for Jarkko would be too limited considering the other weapons in the Swiss armoury.

The first game drew a fairly accurate picture of what Jarkko faced - a love game on serve with already two clean winners from Wawrinka.
Nieminen held serve thanks to a few loose shots from Wawrinka who tightened his game to hold again to love and lead 2-1.
2 break points went begging on the Jarkko serve and then the first point was taken off the Swiss serve in game 5.  True it was a double fault but Nieminen would take anything at this point.

As well as Stan was serving, Jarkko could so far match him on the scoreboard and at 4-5 he tried again to even the match. From 30-15 two loose forehands gave Wawrinka set point - that was saved but not the next and a forehand winner decided it 6-4.

Stan increased his advantage winning the first three games of set two, the break of Neiminen in the second, a long and painful experience for Jarkko including 3 deuces.  More pain in the fourth game when a double fault was sandwiched by Wawrinka magic to produce 3 break points, 2 of which were saved, but not the third and so the set was just about done. 4-0 to Stan.

Losing focus for a few moments Wawrinka dropped his next serve, but it mattered only statistically.
Neiminen still found himself having to serve at 2-5 to remain in contention for the set and he failed to achieve that requirement, meaning Stan led 6-4 6-2.

Broken in the third game of set 3 after wasting 3 break points on the previous Neiminen serve, Wawrinka actually trailed 2-1.  The break back was immediate and games went with serve until, as with set one, Jarkko had to hold at 4-5 for the match to live on.

A couple of Swiss forehand winners and an unforced mistake on match point and that was the finish for the Finnish player. 6-4 6-2 6-4 for the defending champion whose serving today was first class.