Hype Machine: Nadal Wins by Losing at Wimbledon

Hype Machine: Nadal Wins by Losing at Wimbledon

By Richard Vach, Tennis-X.com Senior Writer

World No. 1 Roger Federer walked away with the hardware in July after
a fourth consecutive Wimbledon title, but it was Spaniard Rafael Nadal
who came out a winner, showing that no surface is now off limits when
it comes to what has developed into the greatest rivalry since Pete
and Andre.



In three weeks, beginning at The Stella Artois Championships where he
led former Wimbledon champ Lleyton Hewitt by a set before eventually
retiring with injury in the quarterfinals, Nadal went from grasscourt
neophyte to being compared with Bjorn Borg, the last man with the
skill-set to win at the French Open and Wimbledon in the same year.

Prior to this year Nadal had amassed an underwhelming 3-2 record in
two appearances at Wimbledon.

As the Spaniard continued to take advantage of a soft Wimbledon draw
and progress toward the latter rounds, Federer watched with an 'Isn't
that cute! Rafa is winning some grasscourt matches!' attitude. The
Swiss speculated on an unlikely grasscourt meeting with Nadal, and
also giving himself an apparently-needed ego boost regarding his
improvement on clay, and Nadal's lack of success on grass.

"Obviously I'd like to play him here four or five times, but grass is
such a short season," Federer said. "I'm lucky enough my strength is
also on clay, on hardcourt, indoor -- that's what he's still working
on. That's also why I'm by far the No. 1 player in the world."

By the time the Wimbledon final rolled around, the gap between Swiss
and Spaniard wasn't looking that large. A few over-excited American
journalists and television personalities were actually picking Nadal
to win. Federer trumped Rafa 6-0, 7-6(5), 6-7(2), 6-3 in the final,
but the "by far" No. 1 player in the world had been challenged, and
then some, in a place that was seemingly off-limits to the Fed-Rafa
rivalry.

Forget the lopsided first set as, just like the French Open final a
month earlier, Federer was at his overwhelming best as he came out
firing, and Nadal was so nervous he had trouble at times finding the
court with consecutive groundstrokes. And like the French final he
settled down in the second set where a tiebreak win could have meant a
five-setter. Instead he lost the breaker, won the third in a breaker,
and had his spirit broken in the fourth and final set.

"I'm very well aware of how important this match was for me," said
Federer, who beat Nadal for only the second time in eight meetings.
"If I lose, obviously it's a hard blow for me...At Wimbledon I knew it
was gonna be the place for me to do it the easiest way. Turned out to
be tough and it shows how much he's improved over maybe an entire
year."

Losing in the final, Nadal left the All England Club a winner.

Federer's difficult draw contained two-time Nottingham champion
Richard Gasquet, four-time Wimbledon semifinalist Tim Henman, Tomas
Berdych who beat the Swiss at the Olympics, and Mario "Baby Goran"
Ancic, the last player to beat him at Wimbledon. None could win even a
set off the Swiss. In the end only Nadal, the lawn neophyte, took a
set off Federer, and lost another narrowly in a tiebreak.

The narrowing of the gap on the surface Federer had long dominated was
not lost on Nadal, whose English parallels his improving all-surface
game.

"I saw in the match when I was playing my best tennis, when I was
playing good, the match is close, very close," Nadal said of the
final. "Not much difference, no? So that's good. That's nice for me.
And the title is for him, so that's the real thing now, no? But we
gonna see. We gonna see. I want to improve...This is his best surface,
and I wasn't too far away, but he was better."

Next up is the North American hardcourt season leading to the US Open,
where Federer looks to improve his hardcourt record against Nadal. The
Spaniard has won two of their three career meetings on hardcourt, most
recently at the beginning of this year in the final at Dubai. Nadal's
mental strength showed through in coming back from a set down in
Dubai, only his second tournament of the year after returning from
injury in February, weathering the early-goings of a final that saw
Federer in devastating form.

Federer's part-time coach, Tony Roche, even conceded during Wimbledon
that Rafa's advantage over Federer on clay also extends to the
hardcourts.

"It's a great rivalry," Roche said, speaking with FOX Sports. "Roger's
got to find a way (to beat Nadal) on clay and hardcourt is probably
the same."

Limited scheduling for both the world No. 1 and No. 2 this summer
means their chances of meeting before the US Open will likely be
limited to the Masters Series events in Toronto and Cincinnati. Like
taking the first step of a 12-step program, after Wimbledon Federer
finally admitted that Nadal's spinny, kicky, lefty game, and five
consecutive losses dating to 2005 had gotten into his head.

"A little bit," Federer said. "The important thing was to keep my
motivation up and not think about the losing."

Now that he is no longer completely safe from the muscle-bound
Spaniard, even on his own grasscourts, Federer's next motivation will
be to extend a winning record over Nadal to another surface beside the
green lawns.

For all the Pete vs. Andre hype of the back-in-the-day rivalry, you
could always see that when Agassi was at the top of his game, it still
wasn't enough to beat Pete at his best. Through the first seven months
of 2006 we've seen Federer playing some of his best tennis on
hardcourt and clay -- and losing to Nadal.

For a player being fast-tracked as the best ever, the increasingly
ego-driven Swiss can't be happy losing four of five finals against
Nadal in 2006. Never mind thinking about where the race for No. 1
would be had Nadal not missed the swing Down Under and the bounty of
points at the Australian Open in January.

It can't be easy being Roger Federer, closing the gap on the Sampras
record while Nadal holds the career edge over you -- and is only
getting better, on all surfaces.

Richard Vach is a senior writer for Tennis-X.com who can currently be
seen on The Tennis Channel's "Tennis Insiders: Super Insiders"
episodes, and was recently awarded "Best Hard News" story for 2005 by
the United States Tennis Writers Association. You can belittle him at
rvach@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
.

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