The final sixteen of the 2011 French Open is shaping up, and there's no surprises thus far. Rafael Nadal cemented his place with a win over Antonio Veic of Croatia. The final scores for that matchup were 6-1, 6-3, 6-0, and as you can tell, the Croat didn't put up much of a fight. Of course, he also was not expected to. The little resistance he provided in the second set was the most anybody expected. Nadal will await another day seven matchup to determine whether he will face the hard-serving Croat Ivan Ljubicic or fellow compatriot Fernando Verdasco.
Veic had previously beaten Nikolay Davydenko in the second round, and actually scored a couple of breaks in the second set against Nadal. For a lot of players, that would be enough to take it to a fourth set ... not against the King of Clay himself, however. Veic wilted and Nadal cruised into the round of sixteen.
Andy Murray also made it to the round of sixteen in impressive fashion. Well, it wasn't as impressive as Nadal's win, but how often can a player not named Novak Djokovic in 2011 actually claim something like that anyway? Murray's 6-2, 6-2, 6-2 win over Michael Berrer of Germany puts him through as he searches for his first grand slam title. Berrer didn't play badly, but Murray did make a few mistakes and that's why it wasn't a total blowout. Murray will be taking on Viktor Troicki of Serbia, who just beat Alexandr Dolgopolov in four sets.
Mardy Fish, Verdasco and a few others still have matches for the day, so stay tuned for those.