Flawless US Open champ Rafael Nadal's resurgence to the top

With two Grand Slam and two Masters titles don’t even begin to do justice to the year Rafael Nadal has had.
ATP world number one Rafael Nadal | AP
ATP world number one Rafael Nadal | AP

CHENNAI: THE LAST week of May 2016 was shaping up to be the beginning of a good 14 days for Rafael Nadal. Having battled injuries and without a Major win for nearly two years, his longest such streak since he had won his first in 2004, the Spaniard looked in prime form on his favoured piece of real estate – vast swathes of clay. In the first round, he had beaten Australian Sam Groth 1, 1 and 1.
He followed that up with an even better performance against Argentina’s Facundo Bagnis 3, 0 and 3 – giving up just nine games in the process. In 10 previous attempts, he had never performed better (in 2012 also he had lost nine games in the first two rounds).

Just as the bookmakers were shortening odds for the third time in five days, tragedy struck. In a hastily arranged press conference, the then 29-year-old announced his withdrawal.

While that in itself was a shock, the extent of his injury was staggering. “I could play (against Bagnis),” Nadal began. “But the thing is yesterday (Thursday, May 26) night I started to feel more and more pain, and today in the morning I feel that I could not move much of my wrist. So I came here, did MRI and echography. The results are not positive.

“The sheath of the tendon is suffering. It’s inflamed. If I go on playing it’s going to break and it will mean months off the circuit. In the current condition of my wrist it might just take a few weeks without moving. (...). We have reached the end of our tether here in what was possible.” Shedding a few tears as well, Nadal rode off. He came back to the play the Olympics as well as the US Open but the body wasn’t yet there. So he shut down his season in the third week of October. He posted a small note on Facebook and ended it thus: “Now it is time to rest and start preparing intensively (for) the 2017 season.”

Boy, has he lived up that promise! Two Grand Slam and two Masters titles don’t even begin to do justice to the year he has had.

It’s not that the World No 1 has returned; there may even be a case to say he has never had a more successful year. He has made more money and won more trophies in previous years but the way he has reinvented himself after the disappointment of Down Under — up 3-1 against Roger Federer in the fifth set in the final of the Australian Open — was peak Nadal.

His great rival and greater friend Federer captured two of the first three Slams of the year to make the GOAT debate a non-existent one.

At Flushing Meadows, the Swiss was odds on to make it 20. The Spaniard, whose last hard-court title had come in January 2014 (Doha), spat at those predictions. He found answers to seemingly unsolvable questions, further developed his lethal forehand, won 89% of his service games thanks to an industrial-grade second serve that opponents found hard to score points off. With new tactics and strategies in place, he won two more Grand Slams to go two clear of Pete Sampras 14 months after being condemned to the history books.

Former Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich’s infamous proclamation has long been derided as a tired cliche but it still makes sense. “Don’t ever underestimate the heart of a champion.”

Anderson vows to be back on big stage

Kevin Anderson says don’t count him out just yet even after an impressive two-week run ended in failure. “I’d love to build on these two weeks,” Anderson said. “It was very difficult, but I was able to find my way into the finals. I’ll work very hard to give myself another opportunity.”

23-2

Nadal’s Major record this year. His losses came vs Roger Federer & Gilles Muller

1345

Number of days Nadal went from winning his last hardcourt title (Doha in 2014)

swaroop@newindianexpress.com

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