Nadal confidently moves past Gerasimov as Giustino wins Roland Garros thriller against Moutet

Rafael Nadal fought his way past Gerasimov at the Roland Garros to reach the next round while Giustino emerged victories after a six-hour battle.

Rafael Nadal stepped onto the court today to face Egor Gerasimov of Belarus to start off his journey to another grand slam title if all goes well. It wasn't the typical Nadal Roland Garros 1st round performance as Gerasimov gave him quite the trouble today. Nadal usually ends these early matches quickly but today it took him 122 minutes.

The first set was tightly contested with Gerasimov only allowing once break which was enough for Nadal to win ti 6-4 but it didn't look dominant from the Spaniard. The 2nd followed a similar path as Nadal broke Egor early to take a 3-1 lead but once again it was far from a dominant display. The result was once more 6-4 as we prepared for the 3rd set. In it, Nadal got broken first with Egor taking a 2-0 lead before Nadal became serious understand that he was playing with fire.

He unleashed the proper Nadal winning six games in a row to end it with 6-2 and advance to the next round of Roland Garros.

The match of the day was, if not in name then certainly by the story told on the courts, was played elsewhere. Moutet and Giustino finished their thrilling battle after playing over six hours. Ultimately the Italian emerged victorious in the final set that lasted 3 hours and displayed the score 18-16. A heroic performance from both of them, especially impressing on the part of the Italian who earner his main draw spot after emerging victorious in the qualifiers.