nadal federer question

bolo

G.O.A.T.
If nadal were flavor flav and federer were brett mich.....

Here is a simple question: Is it really true off-clay that the nadal forehand finds federer's backhand more often than federer's forehand finds nadal's backhand? This is a symmetric relationship so it's always surprising to me that people make such a big deal only out of nadal picking on the fed. backhand. Here are some thoughts on why this might or might not be true:

One thing is that fed. with his forehand can just end points much quicker than nadal, who takes about 2-3 more shots to breakdown the fed. backhand. So I believe this confuses us into thinking that nadal somehow finds it easier to find fed's backhand than the other way around.

The other thing is that nadal imo does cheat a little bit more than fed. towards his backhand side, while fed. doesn't really cheat and just hops around his backhand when the timing is right. This suggests to me that it is easier for nadal to find fed's backhand and that nadal is a little faster than fed because he is willing to give up that territory.

The final thing is that nadal has this nice safe little DTL backhand which hamstrings fed. because that reduces the number of opportunities for the fed. forehand. Nadal has always had this shot and I wonder if he developed it because players were breaking down nadal's backhand with their forehands on clay.
 

Nadal_Freak

Banned
Nadal's backhand is quite good so Fed is more likely to hit randomly to keep Nadal guessing rather than how Nadal plays Federer.
 
The other thing is that nadal imo does cheat a little bit....

Huh? That's called great ball anticipation, pal.

Lefties play a lot more righties so their backhands have been attacked by opponents' forehand a lot more than the other way around. That's why you find most lefties have very good backhand. It's a necessity to survive. On the other hand, righties' weak backhands are not an issue, until once for a while when the backhands have to face the forehand of a lefty.
 

Nadal_Monfils

Semi-Pro
^^^ No, it's not great ball anticipation. Nadal sits farther towards his backhand corner so he can hit as many forehands as possible. Federer also does it, but not quite as far as Nadal because he isn't as fast as Nadal.
 

David L

Hall of Fame
The issue between righties and lefties is very simple. Lefties are used to playing righties, but righties are not used to playing lefties. That's it.

Because about 90% of the world's population are right handed, both righty and lefty tennis players end up naturally hard-wiring their games towards coping with right handers, this gives a clear advantage to the lefty when encountering a righty. It does not guarantee the lefty will win, but it's just an added extra assist. After 20 years of hard-wiring geared to predominantly dealing with right-handers, it's quite a challenge to beat a lefty who is close to your level of play.
 
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