Nadal just two hours ago produced a convincing mix of both offensive and defensive tennis to crush Canadian Pospisil in straight sets. This was never ever going to be anything different with a huge void in class between the two. From the second game of the first set Pospisil already looked exhausted at the sight of the Spanish Bull's seemingly in-penetrable defense as he eventually gave in to the relentless pressure the US Open champion was applying from his entrenched baseline position.

Nadal was in no mood to dance, crushing Pospisil in 3 Quick Sets

If your not prepared to come forward at every given opportunity when playing Nadal your never going to win, unless your Djokovic or Federer. It didn't take Pospisil long before he started going big on most of his shots realising he would loose this match anyway so he may as well go down shooting. At 3-1 Nadal in the first and Pospisil was already trying to hit winners from tight angles and they weren't paying off enough. 

The Canadian had a whiff of a chance in the second set when he broke Nadal only to capitulate on his own serve before gifting one more service game to loose the second set. He pretty much waved goodbye to the third set right off the bat loosing his serve in the first game. Nadal looks mean, lean and in no mood to play hitting a frightening high percentage of returns of serve and low number of unforced errors, watch out Karen Khachanov, the Spanish bull is charging your way in the next round!

Watch Nadal Crush Pospisil in 3 Straight

Nadal will have a fairly straight forward run to the Semi Final now, where he will then face someone like Wawrinka, Del Potro or Raonic. All three will give him a stern test.

Murray Tanks to Verdasco

His first real test in this years Open and he failed miserably. Murray lost to Verdasco in four sets and looked completely out of sorts. At this rate you do wonder whether the Scot is going to find his feet again after injury, he just looks so ineffective against any half decent player. Just look how he went out to Lucas Pouille in Cincinnati too.

But I think it's too early to write him off, give it another 6 months and that will then be crunch time if he doesn't start showing substantial improvement by then.

Watch Murray Get Outplayed by Verdasco for Only the 2nd Time in 15 Meetings

Murray clearly looked tired during the New York heat. But he remained positive after the defeat and said there is a good chance he will be back competing at the later stages of the big tournaments after he gets more match practice under his belt.

My Dark Horse Trots On

My dark horse pick for the tournament Stan Wawrinka (40/1 to win) won in convincing fashion again, 3 sets to 1 against French youngster Ugo Humbert. Wawrinka's ground strokes were too hot for the Humbert who put up a decent fight but didn't have the fitness nor the finesse to ruffle the feathers of the 2016 champion.

Watch Stan Prove He is Still the Man

Wawrinka's real test comes next when he faces Milos Raonic in round 3. Raonic is one of the more accomplished net players who enjoys coming in to finish his points off rather quickly - this will work well against Stan's heavy fore and backhand. Raonic also has a thunderous serve so he won't be broken easily. If Wawrinka can overcome Raonic, he will have confidence when he likely faces Del Potro in the Quarter Final.

Medvedev Win's the Battle of the Next Gen

The unlikely winner of the clash of horns between the Next Gen players was the Russian. Medvedev who was this weeks Winston Salem ATP winner but was ruled the underdog when taking on the Greek freak and Rogers Cup finalist Stefanos Tsitsipas. But he overcame him in four sets in a dominant display winning all his sets with a break of serve.

To give you an idea of how young these two are, Roger Federer has 4 more years professional tennis experience than the two put together.

Medvedev goes on to face another Next Gen player in Round 3 Borna Coric who beat him comfortably in Cincinatti, they are 2-2 on head to heads. Let's see if the young Russian can get revenge here. I think he can!

2 American's Out, 2 Left

American Number 1 John Isner was relived to come through a 5 Set battle against Chile's Nicolas Jarry

The second upset of the night came when American Number 2 Jack Sock lost to Georgian Nikoloz Basilashvili in 3 sets. Sock has been struggling for form since coming back from injury and was clearly suffering in the heat of New York. Having taken the first set he then let 2 slip in quick succession before going out fighting in a 4th set tie break.

Steve Johnson was the other American casualty of the night going out against Dominic Thiem in a big 5 set dual. Thiem who has never put a decent run together at a Grand Slam hard court event is looking to break that curse. He will play Taylor Fritz in the next round, one of the remaining two Americans.

American Number 1 John Isner is the other survivor of the night but only just. He took 5 sets to beat Chilean Nicolas Jarry ranked 31 places below him. Isner being the size he is could do without too many more of these 5 set matches so early in the tournament, he is going to come up against far greater opponents than Jarry and needs to conserve as much energy as possible, notably Raonic or Wawrinka in the next round if he now can beat Serbian Dusan Lajovic in Round 3.