Novak Djokovic produced a dominant performance in the fourth round action at the Miami Open presented by Itau, beating 15th seed Lorenzo Musetti 6-2, 6-2.
The match lasted one hour and 22 minutes and was played under extremely challenging conditions due to high humidity following rain.
After trailing 0-2 in the first set, Novak clicked into higher gear and found his best form, taking full control of the contest and leaving his rival without any answer. With an incredible display, he won nine consecutive games – including four breaks – before the Italian managed to win one and narrow the gap to 6-2, 3-1.
From that point on, both players held their serves until the final game, when Novak secured another break to wrap up a convincing victory over his 15-years-younger opponent.
“He had a really good start. First couple of games I started a little bit slow and then I knew that if I give him time, he’s going to make his shots,” Djokovic said. “He loves kind of running around his backhand, hitting forehands. But he is so talented, he can play any shot in the game on any surface. It was tough, particularly in the first seven, eight games of the match. But I think breaking his serve to come back to 2-all and break right away at 3-2, it was a momentum shift and I tried to use that.”
Match stats: aces (1-1), double faults (1-3), winners (18-10), unforced errors (17-18), total points won (62-40).
Novak will now face no.24 seed Sebastian Korda (1-0 H2H record) in the Masters 1000 event quarter-finals.
The American advanced to this stage by outplaying Gael Monfils in three sets.
The match is scheduled on Thursday about 02:00 CET.
Photo: Profimedia
