The No.6 seed from London totally overpowered Egyptian Omar Abdel Aziz, winning 11-2, 11-6, 11-4 to book his place in the second round of the North American Open.
It looked like the tall left-hander might blast his way through the third game without dropping a point but at 9-0 he was stunned to receive a no let from the match officials.
Barker certainly looks in fine shape, playing tight, fast, powerful, aggressive squash. He said: "I have been playing fairly well recently but have always seemed to come up against Nick Matthew in every tournament. I'm just pleased to see him in the other half of the draw this week!"
His seeded quarter-final opponent is fellow Englishman James Willstrop, who beat French qualifier Yann Perrin 12-10, 11-6, 11-8 in 37 minutes. After a tough opening game, Willstrop gained the ascendancy but the match became scrappy in the third game. When Willstrop reached match ball, Perrin left the court to stop a trickle of blood from his knee. When play resumed, Willstrop quickly won the deciding point to book his place in the second round.
In the first battle of the qualifiers, New Zealand's Martin Knight produced a polished performance to overcome Mathieu Castagnet of France. Knight won 11-7, 2-11, 11-7, 11-7 in 55 minutes. Castagnet was unstoppable in the second game but Knight recovered strongly to book his place in the last 16 against James Willstrop.
After 93 minutes of a match that turned into a brutal bloodbath, Nafizwan Adnan survived a ferocious onslaught from Stephane Galifi to reach the second round after a tense tiebreak in which both players were on the floor after collisions in the front right corner.
Adnan won 11-6, 8-11, 11-5, 6-11, 13-11 and now meets Peter Barker.
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