Nadal's hardcourt peak has to be 2013. He won Indian Wells, and later did the Canadian Open, Cincinnati and US Open triple.
Yeah, i was thinking about it too. 2013 was the most consistent hard court performance in Rafa's whole career. Although i think Rafa in 2013 was already a little bit compromised physically (he was not as fast as 2005-2012). Rafa's forehand on hard in 2013 was definitely his peak though. Especially forehand down the line, which made the difference during summer hc swing. Although i think Rafa's form from US Open 2010 was a tiny bit better, but the difference is very narrow.
Nadal wasn't very good at that tournament, Murray won a not so close match. It may have been burn out moment after a brutal summer but still, that's what we saw.
Certainly in terms of movement. I noticed Nadal's movement in the 2009 clay season wasn't quite as good as before, even while he was continuing to win tournaments.
Wb2007 is debatable but it's not ridiculous to say.
Watch the matches. Nadal's mobility was better in 2008 in particular.
But at the 2008 French Open, Nadal looked several levels above other players. There wasn't that same vibe at the 2010 French Open. I'd even put the 2007, 2012 and 2017 versions of French Open Nadal above the 2010 version.
Nadal was unbeaten on clay in 2006, but the 2006 French Open was clearly his worst French Open (form-wise) from 2005-2008.
The final was his best performance at the 2010 French Open. At the 2008 French Open, I couldn't imagine any player winning even 2 sets against Nadal. I was trying to imagine worst case scenarios at the time, and I couldn't imagine even Federer, even Djokovic, winning 2 sets against that Nadal, let alone 3 sets. In the end, neither won a set.
must be a sign that you are not the goat if you win that triple then.
Think he could beat 10 Djokovic?
We were really spoiled, it was such a fun time
AO 2017 is his 4th best run at the AO, 2014 was better pre-final but 2017'dal would beat injured'dal. But yeah it's no where near 2009 or 2012.
It's really only because of the injury tough, Nadal played very well up until the semis in 2014 and significantly better than 2017 where he struggled far too much against good but not unbeatable players.
His 2008 Olympics run on hard was impresionante though.
Yeah as good as Wawrinka was i don't see him taking either Nadal or Federer in a slam final. They're just terrible match ups for him.
Feds 2005 season win % is mighty impressive
That's debatable.
Nadal's only close match before the 2014 Australian Open final was against Dimitrov in the quarter finals, which Nadal won 3-6, 7-6, 7-6, 6-2. That first set was the only set that Nadal dropped before the final. A closeish 3-setter with Nishikori too.
AO 17 SF was really fire arguably a top 5/10 match at AO. So maybe debatable but 2014 Nadal had a bit closer to his old physicality and destroyed Fed.
And in 2019 he didn't drop any sets before the final, so we have to conclude that was his strongest run to AO final? Number of sets dropped is not everything.
His HC peak would have to be 2013. He didn't lose a match until Beijing.
It was in some ways. Nadal played excellent attacking tennis at the 2019 Australian Open, peaking against Tsitsipas in the semi final. What got exposed in the final was that Nadal's defence wasn't up to the necessary standard at that point, while Djokovic suddenly peaked in the semi final (even better than Nadal's performance) and in the final.
Nadal didn’t win any other big HC titles in 2010 though
You guys always are great for laughs. If you ran a comedy troup you would probably make millions.Nadal in 2010 was blasting backhands like it was 2013 3 years before and his serve all year, but especially at the US Open was far better. In 2011 in FDL was also not working.
2019 Nadal was exceptional against the field he was up against. Put him up against 2012 or 2009 Nadal, and he gets his sh1t rocked 10 times out of 10.
Agree. All the players Nadal played en route to the final, great as they were, were guys who either required just a little more time on the ball - Tsitsipas, Tiafoe etc etc, or were not as good at transitioning from defence to offence quickly (Berdych). There was no one to fully test Nadal defensively to see how he was going to go defending the court.
They don't make kits like that anymore. Absolute fire.Not "big" but he did win Tokyo after the US Open.
It's literally insane how bad his 2024 kits were
