She fell behind 5-0 in the second set before Konta started to tighten up and Williams found her range to get a break back and hold serve at love for 5-2.
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Coming into the match, Nadal had won 14 of 16 previous meetings between the pair. “You have to be proactive I think with things like this and go and speak to the players rather than them reading about it in the newspapers or, you know, listening to it on the TV or the radio”.
“My response is that there’s always going to be, especially these days when there is a lot of speculation – this is now the main story in tennis, in sports world – there’s going to be a lot of allegations”, Djokovic said.
Konta though, steadied herself on her next service game, she was forced to defend two break points but completed the job with another booming serve that saw Williams’ return hit the net.
On the men’s side, No. 13 Milos Raonic followed up his win over Roger Federer in the final of the Brisbane International tune-up event with a 6-1, 6-4, 6-4 win over Lucas Pouille, and No. 32 Joao Sousa beat Mikhail Kukushkin 6-3, 6-4, 6-3.
Earlier Maria Sharapova breezed into the third round with a 6-2 6-1 win over Belarusian Aliaksandra Sasnovich. “I thought I served great”. John Millman, Australia, def. Diego Schwartzman, Argentina, 3-6, 5-7, 7-6 (2), 5-0, retired.
Another big name to depart was the second seed in the women’s draw, Simone Halep, who crashed out 6-4, 6-3 to China’s Zhang Shuai, who had to pre-qualify for the tournament and finally won a match in a Grand Slam at the 15th attempt.
That background was not about to escape the attention of the local media, particularly after the impressive nature of her 6-4 6-2 win over the seven-times grand slam champion and former world number one.
The 35 year old who was seeded No 8 after her brilliant 2015 season thanks to her quarterfinals reach at the Australian and US Open however, was no match for the 24 year old Konta today probably because of the heat.
“I think being down set point nearly helped me”.
Li, an Asian trailblazer whose feats sparked a surge in tennis’ popularity across the region, said she missed being on Tour but was content with her new life outside tennis.
“So I definitely will be ready for that”.
A strong run in the third grand slam of the year might see her grace Centre Court at Wimbledon, however, even if the home of British tennis has less meaning to her than some of her compatriots.
Matches to look for Wednesday in Melbourne include (1) Serena Williams testing her recent knee injury vs. Taipei’s Su-Wei Hsieh, (4) Aggie Radwanska vs. Genie Bouchard, and (6) Petra Kvitova vs. Aussie comer Daria Gavrilova.
“I play very hard, and every player I play seems to play hard”, she said.
The Russian, attempting to win her first title at Melbourne Park since 2008, was in blistering form to take the match 6-1, 6-3 in 73 minutes on Margaret Court Arena on Monday night.
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Williams has only fallen in the second round of a Grand Slam tournament twice in her career – losing to her sister Venus in her Australian Open debut in 1998, and being beaten by Garbine Muguruza at the 2014 French Open.
