Nadal, Ferrer win Barcelona openers

Barcelona, Spain – Reigning champion Rafael Nadal and 2011 runner-up David Ferrer were among Wednesday's second-round winners at the $2.135 million Barcelona Open.

The top-seeded former world No. 1 Nadal blew past fellow Spaniard Guillermo Garcia-Lopez 6-1, 6-2 in 81 minutes, while a third-seeded world No. 6 Ferrer drilled Serbian wild card Filip Krajinovic 6-0, 6-3 in a mere 58 minutes on the red clay at the Real Club de Tenis Barcelona.

Nadal, who upset current No. 1 Novak Djokovic in last week's final at the Monte Carlo Masters to capture a record 20th Masters championship, has won six of the last seven Barcelona titles and topped the three-time runner-up Ferrer in last year's all-Spanish finale here. Ferrer has been the Barcelona runner-up three of the last four years.

Up next for Nadal will be Colombian qualifier Robert Farah.

Fifth-seeded Serbian Janko Tipsarevic beat Romanian Victor Hanescu 7-5, 6-4, while seventh-seeded Spanish lefthander Feliciano Lopez dismissed Italian Flavio Cipolla 6-4, 6-3.

Meanwhile, eighth-seeded rising Japanese Kei Nishikori defeated Kazakhstan's Mikhail Kukushkin 6-3, 4-6, 6-0 and 11th-seeded Canadian mover Milos Raonic dismissed Russian Igor Andreev 6-4, 6-1. Raonic should have his hands full with sixth-seeded Spanish clay-court specialist Nicolas Almagro on Day 4.

The aforementioned Farah surprised the Casablanca champion from two weeks ago, 16th-seeded Spaniard Pablo Andujar, 7-6 (10-8), 4-6, 7-5 on Wednesday.

In other action involving seeds, No. 13 South African Kevin Anderson got past Argentine qualifier Federico Delbonis 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (7-5), Spanish crowd favorite Albert Montanes saved four match points before upending No. 15 Aussie Bernard Tomic 6-0, 5-7, 7-5, and No. 17 Spaniard Albert Ramos doused France's Benoit Paire 6-3, 7-5. Ramos was the recent clay-court runner-up in Casablanca. Montanes will tangle with his compatriot Ferrer in the round of 16.

Additional second-round wins came for Finn Jarkko Nieminen, Portuguese Frederico Gil and Colombian Santiago Giraldo, who will meet second-seeded Andy Murray on Thursday.

This week's big winner will collect $398,000.