Fourth seed Rafael Nadal was stunned by Serb Viktor Troicki in an upset-filled Shanghai Masters second round on Wednesday while Andy Murray breezed past American Steve Johnson and Nick Kyrgios slumped to a listless defeat.
Troicki, ranked 31st in the world, overcame Nadal 6-3 7-6 (3) in an hour and 34 minutes to secure his first ever victory in five previous attempts against the 14-time Grand Slam winner.
The unseeded Serb broke twice to seal the opening set before Nadal came back strongly in the second. The Spaniard saved a match point at 5-4 down but was defeated in the tiebreak.
“I played really well,” Troicki said. “I was aggressive, I served well, I hit the ball nice. It was a great feeling on the court playing like this... against Rafa Nadal, who is a great champion.”
Two-time Shanghai Masters champion Murray, who claimed the China Open title last week, had no such trouble as he won 6-3, 6-2, claiming 70% of second-serve return points.
The second-seeded Briton, who scraped through a testing encounter with Johnson at the Rio Olympics in August, also saved the one break point he faced in the first set.
{{/usCountry}}The second-seeded Briton, who scraped through a testing encounter with Johnson at the Rio Olympics in August, also saved the one break point he faced in the first set.
{{/usCountry}}He will play Frenchman Lucas Pouille in the third round.
“I felt like I was creating a lot of chances on his serve. I thought I moved well for the first match in new conditions,” Murray told reporters.
“I was timing the ball well. I felt like I was controlling a lot of the rallies. Yeah, for a first match after playing pretty different conditions a few days ago, it was good.”
Australia’s Nick Kyrgios lost to Germany’s Mischa Zverev 6-3 6-1 with another controversial display in which he appeared uninterested throughout, landing a series of half-hearted serves and barely moving to meet his opponent’s returns.
The 21-year-old also clashed with spectators before being booed off the court after a match that lasted just 48 minutes. Kyrgios, later apologised on his Twitter account, saying his performance was “not good enough”.
Seventh seed Tomas Berdych lost to Marcel Granollers of Spain 7-6 (4), 7-6 (1), while third seed Stan Wawrinka, the US Open Champion, beat Britain’s Kyle Edmund 6-3, 6-4 and Canada’s Vasek Pospisil battled past Grigor Dimitrov 7-5, 7-6 (2).