By Steve Keating
MIAMI (Reuters) – Kei Nishikori’s return to competitive tennis suffered an early blow on Thursday when the former-Miami Open finalist was swept out of the opening round 6-3 6-4 by Austrian Sebastian Ofner.
Seeing his first action since last July and playing his first Masters 1000 event in nearly three years, the injury prone Nishikori was unable to produce the energetic form that took him to the 2014 U.S. Open final and number four in the world rankings.
Returning at one of tennis’s biggest and most prestigious tournaments following a long injury layoff was always going present a challenge but the 34-year-old might have liked his chances against Ofner, who had lost three consecutive matches and six of his last seven.
Predictably there was simply too much rust on Nishikori’s game as he finished the contest without registering a single ace or converting any of his three break chances.
At the other end of the court, Ofner fired down nine aces and broke Nishikori once in each set as he registered only his second win at a Masters event.
“It’s never easy to play against a guy like him, he was a top player for years,” said Ofner, who next faces 20th seed Francisco Cerundolo.
“For me it was a good match since I’ve been struggling a bit and I just tried to not give him too much rhythm.”
The day got off to a slippery start when the first match on Hard Rock stadium court between Canada’s Felix Auger-Aliassime and Adam Walton was suspended after just one game due to a light rain.
When play resumed 35 minutes later, Auger-Aliassime completed a 7-5 6-4 win over the plucky Australian qualifier, who was making his Masters tournament debut and seeking his first ever ATP Tour win.
Leading 5-4 Walton had three set points to clinch the opener but could not finish off the Canadian, who roared back to win three straight games to snatch the set.
“I wasn’t doing anything too bad in the first set, I thought he was just playing really well, serving to his targets,” said Auger-Aliassime, who will face fourth seed Alexander Zverev in the second round. “He was making me work.
“It was tricky, he was not missing much but I’m happy with the way I handled it, to come out of a match like this in straight sets to start things off is positive for me.”
(Reporting by Steve Keating in Miami, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
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