Nadal: “Now tennis is mostly about power. I would like to see more different gamestyles. Tactic doesn't exist anymore."

[abmk]

Djokovic being closer to Federer, who obviously approaches much more than both, or closer to Nadal wasn't really the point. When you are talking about tens of thousands of points over hundreds of matches, a 2% difference means he's approaching much less than Djokovic as well. It isn't that close.

Actually that was the point I addressed - since you bunched Federer and Djokovic atogether.
By your logic, Federer approaches the net MUCH MUCH more than Djokovic.
Djokovic does approach the net more than Nadal, but margin isn't as much as you make it out to be.

 

[NoleFam]

Actually that was the point I addressed - since you bunched Federer and Djokovic atogether.
By your logic, Federer approaches the net MUCH MUCH more than Djokovic.
Djokovic does approach the net more than Nadal, but margin isn't as much as you make it out to be.

Djokovic does approach the net much less than Federer, but that wasn't the point. The point is Nadal approaches less than both.

 

[abmk]

Djokovic does approach the net much less than Federer, but that wasn't the point. The point is Nadal approaches less than both.

that's fair enough.

 

[Silverbullet96]

Did the tweet get nuked ? I mean I already read it, but still.

 

[RelentlessAttack]

Nadal has never been the hardest hitter on tour so so some of these replies are a little confusing. Fastest player at his peak maybe and most overall physical gamestyle sure but that’s a different question. Lots of spin for sure and baseliner for sure but there’s never been a time of his career that he was afraid of coming in when necessary or mixing up with slice or angles. Plenty of evidence of this even in his first dominant clay season in 05. He’s worked people over all over that RG turf since the beginning. Actually the only time I would have considered Nadal a ballbasher was in 2004 when he came on tour with a flatter forehand - see his early 04 match against Hewitt for example.

It’s only against Roger that he really got comical with the FH to BH spam but then again it makes sense to spam a specific matchup advantage if it can’t be overcome. Djokovic actually has been spamming the same couple of patterns against Nadal ad nauseam since 2011 for example. That’s why Fedovic matches have been the most entertaining of the big 3 matchups on average after 2009

 

[The Fedfather]

I find this comment a bit weird, just because more than at any point in the last decade or so, it actually feels that net play now is becoming a bigger part in top players' gameplan. Both the older and younger guys started to come to net more. And then from the baseline ballbashing is not exactly the go-to tactic, in my watching experience.

The area where things have swung toward power dominance compared to previous years is the serve, and that's exaggerrated with quite a few taller players abd some faster surfaces. But what tactics is Rafa expecting there? If a player has the skill to serve bombs right on the lines, then you bet that's the tactic they are going to use because it's a good one.