He may be the oldest man in the draw at 33, but Tommy Haas earned the generous applause he received as he exited Rod Laver Arena tonight, although his decision to leave the court shirtless may have had something to do with it. The injury-plagued, three-time Australian Open semifinalist acquitted himself well despite losing in straight sets to Rafael Nadal, 6-4, 6-3, 6-4.
It looked initially as if Nadal would make short work of his opponent, now ranked No. 190 and playing his first tournament since Basel last year, as the Spaniard raced to a 4-0 lead. Serving at 1-5, Haas, a notoriously loquacious player, let out a yell of frustration as he fired a backhand long to give up set point, before pulling himself together and acing twice for an invigorating hold. As Nadal was serving for the set, Haas unexpectedly changed his tactics, starting to use his one-handed backhand to roll the ball high, deep, and looping to push Nadal back off the court. It threw the world No. 2 off his stride, and Haas hit a fantastic sliced backhand pass on the run to get a break back. The same tactic worked well enough to give Haas another break point as Nadal served at 5-4, but an ace, a service winner, and a two-shot play set up by another great serve gave Nadal the first set.
When Nadal broke Haas’ serve to lead 1-0 in the second, it again looked as if he would pull away. But Haas once again dug his heels in, and might have broken back had he not missed a second serve return at 30-30 with Nadal serving at 3-2. Nadal served his way out of trouble there and broke Haas for the set, but then veteran changed tactics once more, this time opting to hit flat and go for broke off both wings. For a while, it worked. Haas worked Nadal out wide to the forehand and charged into the net to break his serve to lead 1-0 in the third. Some impeccable serving let him keep the break, but at 3-2 a telegraphed dropshot squandered a game point, and Nadal broke back with a backhand that dipped low to Haas’ feet as he approached the net, snuffing out Haas’ chance to take a set. Three games later, the second seed moved on to the third round.
Nadal finished the match with 36 winners to 17 unforced errors and never looked in danger; he could easily have outrun his opponent over however many sets, but was clearly committed to not doing so, forging forward to the net and hitting some sensational volleys, and serving huge at key moments. It was not his cleanest performance, but it was more than good enough by several orders of magnitude. The 2009 champion continues to look untroubled in Melbourne so far.
—Hannah Wilks