On January 17, Beijing time, the first match day of the Australian Open began to compete. In a focus battle at Rodrawall Stadium, the no. 6 seed Nadal played against geelong, who is ranked 66th in the world. This is the first time in Nadal's career that he has played in a Grand Slam tournament that Federer and Djokovic have missed at the same time, and it is also his second appearance in a Grand Slam tournament after more than 7 months since losing the French Open semi-final last year.
In the first set, Nadal took the lead, and in the first set he was successful in the love game, and Geelong also successfully saved the set. In the 4th set, Nadal took the lead to complete the break and took a 3-1 lead. In the 6th set, Nadal broke four consecutive runs in the opposing serve to win the set 5-1. In the 7th set, Nadal saved his serve easily and won the first set 6-1.
In the second set, Nadal broke the opponent's serve as soon as he came up, and in the second set, Nadal defused the break point to save the serve. In the 9th inning, Nadal missed four end-of-set opportunities in a set where the opponent had no way back, and Gilung held the ball and trailed to 4-5. In the 10th set, Nadal saved the ball to win the set and win the second set 6-4.
In the third set, Nadal started with a series of breaks to take a 2-0 lead. In the fifth set, Nadal broke again and he managed to hold the lead to 5-1. In the 8th set, Nadal won his own serve and saved his serve to win the third set 6-2.
In the end, in a match that took 1 hour and 49 minutes, the No. 6 seed Nadal lost three straight sets and defeated Geelong 6-1, 6-4, 6-2 to reach the second round of the Australian Open men's singles. Nadal's opponent in the next round will be the winner between qualifying player Hanfmann and wild card player Kokinakis.