World number one Rafael Nadal gave another powerful statement of his Australian Open intentions by crushing Croatia's Roko Karanusic 6-2 6-3 6-2 in the second round.
The Spaniard, minus his trademark long shorts and cut off sleeves, raced to victory in 97 minutes for the loss of just seven games.
Nadal has never won the Australian Open but has gradually improved at each of his previous four attempts, culminating in a semi-final appearance last year.
He faces Tommy Haas of Germany in the third round on Saturday and is expecting a much tougher match.
Jo-Wilfried Tsonga completed a great day for French tennis when he beat Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia 6-7 7-6 7-6 6-2.
Tsonga showed no signs of the back injury that forced him to pull out of a warm-up event in Sydney last week as he wore down his opponent with an impressive performance.
Fifth seed Tsonga looked to be in early trouble when he lost the opening set and was down set point in the second set tie-breaker.
But the 23-year-old reeled off a series of spectacular winners to square the match then broke Ljubicic's resistance when he won the third set in a tie-breaker.
It has been 81 years since a Frenchman won the Australian Open men's singles titles but Tsonga, who was runner-up 12 months ago, is not the only one in contention in 2009.
Five Frenchman are through to the third round this time. Fabrice Santoro, the oldest man in the tournament, won on Wednesday, while Gilles Simon, Richard Gasquet and Gael Monfils joined Tsonga in the last 32.
Simon booked his place in the third round with a 6-7 6-4 6-1 6-2 win over Chris Guccione, the last local player in the men's singles draw.
Guccione, a giant lefthander standing 20 centimetres taller than Simon, won the opening set in a tie-breaker but struggled for the rest of the match once the Frenchman succeeded in blunting his booming serve.
Simon, seeded sixth for the first Grand Slam of the year, has made huge strides in world tennis over the last 12 months, reaching a career-high ranking of six.
However he has never made it past the third round of a Slam. He faces Croatia's Mario Ancic on Saturday.
Gasquet beat Uzbek Denis Istomin 6-3 6-4 6-4 and Monfils defeated Austrian Stefan Koubek 6-4 6-4 3-6 6-2.
However Arnaud Clement, a finalist in Australia in 2001, was beaten as was Sebastien De Chaunac.
American James Blake eased into the third round after beating qualifier de Chaunac in a match marred by persistent crowd noise.
One fan, who had constantly harassed de Chaunac throughout the final set, was escorted away by security staff just before the ninth-seeded Blake served out for the 6-3 6-2 6-3 victory on Margaret Court Arena.
De Chaunac had also questioned several line calls and was visibly agitated by the disturbances.
Chilean 13th seed Fernando Gonzalez sped past Argentina's Guillermo Canas 7-5 6-3 6-4.
The 2007 finalist out-punched Canas in a tight first set before completing the win inside two hours and 19 minutes, setting up a clash with 24th seed Gasquet.
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