Nadal earns 200th Grand Slam win

Playing in only his sixth grand slam match, Bagnis broke Nadal’s serve in the opening game before taking a 2-0 lead. But if the 99th-ranked Bagnis harboured any hopes of ending the fourth seed’s bid for a record-extending 10th Roland Garros title, those dreams were brutally crushed as Nadal surrendered only four further games before wrapping up victory. 

Earlier, former champion Ana Ivanovic remained on course to challenge for this year’s title after completing a 7-5, 6-1 win over Japan’s Kurumi Nara in the second round. 

The 2008 champion lost last year’s semi-final to Lucie Šafářova, but showed signs of her very best form by coasting through the second set having edged a tight first set. She will face the winner of the meeting between 18th seed Elina Svitolina or American wild card Taylor Townsend.

Later, seventh seed Tomas Berdych has passed his second-round challenge at the French Open, having defeated Malek Jaziri in four sets. The Czech ace remains on a collision course to face tournament favourite and world number one Novak Djokovic in the quarter-finals, thanks to a 6-1, 2-6, 6-3, 6-4 victory.

Bacsinszky downs Bouchard: 

Timea Bacsinszky’s love affair with Roland Garros continued on Thursday when she swept aside struggling Canadian Eugenie Bouchard 6-4, 6-4 to reach the third round.

A semi-finalist last year where she lost to eventual champion Serena Williams, the Swiss trailed 1-4 in the first set before she took control, winning 10 games in a row to serve for the match at 5-0 in the second. 

Bouchard, semi-finalist here in 2014 staved off defeat by winning that game and she saved a match point on her own serve to pull back to 5-2. The fight-back continued with another break of serve and a hold to get to 5-4, but Bacsinszky finally held firm on her serve at the third time of asking to seal the win.