• Sony Ericsson Open

Woeful Djokovic crashes out of Sony Ericsson Open

Novak Djokovic was completely off colour as Olivier Rochus broke him six times in the second round of the Sony Ericsson Open © Getty Images

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Friday Gallery

World No. 2 Novak Djokovic was a shadow of his usual self as he crashed out of the Sony Ericsson Open, losing 6-2 6-7(7) 6-4 to Belgian Olivier Rochus.

Ranked 59 in the world, Rochus defied his ATP Tour status to leap all over a below-par Djokovic, who produced a shocking display of serving and a buffet of unforced errors in Friday's second round contest. The Serb was broken on six occasions and served 11 double faults as his game simply refused to materialise in Miami.

Djokovic blamed tiredness for his recent exit from the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells, citing a heavy workload as the reason for his defeat to Ivan Ljubicic. On the evidence of Friday's display, the No. 2 seed still requires a day's rest or two after he began in sluggish fashion against Rochus.

Persisting with that straight-armed serving technique that will certainly not make its way into any coaching manuals, Djokovic's first serve barely functioned at times as Rochus broke in the very first game. That set the benchmark for the set as Rochus oozed confidence from the back of the court, racing into a 4-0 lead before clinching the advantage 6-2.

Djokovic's malaise dragged on into the second stanza too, conceding a break in the fifth game, at which point he finally seemed to wake from his slumber. Breaking back immediately after a marathon tussle for 3-3, the No. 2 seed then displayed his battling qualities to force a tie-breaker.

Even then, the serve haunted the Serbian. Serving for the set at 6-5 in the breaker, Djokovic produced a double-fault to haul Rochus back into the set. The Belgian could not capitalise though and Djokovic levelled the scores at one set apiece.

The momentum now seemed to be with Djokovic, yet Rochus immediately put the disappointment of losing the breaker behind him, saving three breaks points in his opening service game before stealing his fourth break of the match to love.

Djokovic responded again to get the final set back with serve at 1-2 and then again at 3-4, but he was operating at only 20 percent of first serves in. Inevitably, Rochus broke once again and this time he held on for a huge victory.

Rafael Nadal made it through to the third round after a clinical 6-4 6-3 victory over Taylor Dent. Nadal took four of four break points to wrap up the match in 70 minutes.

Nadal is looking improve on his No.4 ranking by getting his first Tour win since May 2009. He hasn't won in Miami before, but he was delighted to get off to a good start to this year's tournament.

"It was a good start for me," said Nadal. "Playing against Dent [in the first round] is always a difficult match because you don't have rhythm. I had my chances on the return, small ones, only few ones, and I did [take them]. So I'm happy for that with my victory. 6-4 6-3 is a comfortable win against a difficult opponent."

The No. 8 seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga had no trouble in disposing of Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 6-4 6-3, while Andy Roddick justified his status as the No. 6 seed with a 6-4 6-4 win over Igor Andreev.

"I played okay," said Roddick. "I think the second set was better than the first. Conditions are so much different here than Palm Springs; you're in 90% humidity. All of a sudden the ball is not really jumping or going anywhere.

"These are probably the conditions you don't want to play a guy like Andreev where he can set up and really take a cut at it. So I definitely wasn't comfortable in the first set, but second set was a little better."

BNP Paribas Open winner Ivan Ljubicic was forced to retire during his match with Benjamin Becker on account of a back injury. Ljubicic was leading 6-4 1-0 with a break in the second set when he had to offer his hand.

No. 15 seed David Ferrer is comfortably into the third round after he beat Michael Llodra 6-2 6-4. Ferrer dictated matters from the baseline as he won nearly half of the points on offer from Llodra's second serve, and the scoreline could have been more emphatic had the Spaniard not wasted four break chances in the second set.

Ferrer now faces No. 24 seed Ivo Karlovic, who came through a rain-interrupted tussle with Spain's Daniel Gimeno-Traver to triumph 6-3 6-7(5) 6-3. Despite playing for two hours and 10 minutes, there were just two breaks in the match, with Karlovic staying flawless behind his own serve as he rattled down 28 aces.

Elsewhere, Nicolas Almagro defeated Eduardo Schwank 6-4 7-5, while Juan Carlos Ferrero and Philipp Kohlschreiber both benefited from injuries to Daniel Koellerer and Florian Mayer respectively.

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