Andy Murray, of Great Britain, celebrates winning his second round match against Joao Sousa, of Portugal, during the Australian Open yesterday. PICTURE: GETTY IMAGES.
Dominant Andy Murray dictated terms to the outclassed Joao Sousa, with the Scottish star defying brutally hot conditions to cruise into the third round of the Australian Open.
The reigning US Open champion was largely untroubled by the 40-degree heat, benefiting from another gruelling off- season training program in Miami as he trounced the Portuguese player 6-2, 6-2, 6-4.
"I got up a couple of breaks pretty quickly in the first two sets so I could play, not so much loose points, but I could try to shorten the points, which helps," said Murray.
"I also served well today and got a lot of free points off my serve.
"There were very few rallies.
"So it worked out well for me because it was really tough conditions."
Murray advanced to a first competitive clash with his some-time training partner Ricardas Berankis, of Lithuania, who needed only 77 minutes to send No.25 seed Florian Mayer tumbling out of the Open.
Mayer - who hammered an out-of-sorts Bernard Tomic in the pivotal match of last year's Davis Cup playoff tie against Germany - was trounced 6-2, 6-3, 6-1 by Berankis.
"He's obviously playing well to beat a guy like Mayer that comfortably," Murray said.
"It was a very good win."
French crowd pleaser Jo- Wilfried Tsonga also moved into the third round with a minimum of fuss, although he was somewhat underwhelmed by his performance.
Tsonga - whose best grand slam result came when he reached the final at Melbourne Park in 2008 - proved too good for Japan's Go Soeda, winning 6-3, 7-6 (7-1), 6-3.