There was an early scare for the world tennis number one Rafa Nadal who was two games away from a shock defeat in the second round of the Rome Masters before winning eight straight games to get past an Italian qualifier in three sets.
Nadal's shaky performance contrasted with the imperious Novak Djokovic who crushed the Polish qualifier Lukasz Kubot 6-0 6-3 to stretch his unbeaten run for the year to 33 matches.
Djokovic will replace Nadal as world number one if he wins the Rome title and Nadal fails to reach the semis.
