RS
Bionic Poster
So he beats Sinner too then?
Who was the better Tennis player at age 22 - Nadal or Alcaraz?
- Thread starter Hyde
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Third Serve
Talk Tennis Guru
Fed wins that one, but Alcaraz would put in a solid effort I reckon. He played quite well.
DSH
Bionic Poster
Federer 2008 vs Alcaraz 2025, 10 matches, who would win in all 4 Major tournaments?
tennis_pro
Bionic Poster
eeeee
Nadal lost to several "lesser" players on HC until 2009 - look at the players he lost to at the USO too (Blake, Youzhny, Ferrer who wasn't even in his prime) and in other tournaments. This wasn't an accident.and Tsonga had the match of his life, everything went phenomenally for him that time.
It was much better to lose to someone who was excellent than to lose to someone who was almost 38 years old and had mobility problems, that was embarrassing.
Alcaraz is a miles better HC than Nadal is at the same stage. He's only losing if he's not at his best which wasn't the case for Nadal (who just wasn't that good on HC until 2008 or 2009 even, he just implemented his clay game on HC and it worked at times, but overall it wasn't even close). This isn't the case for Alcaraz who is clearly a top player on HC and he's proved it several times already, his record against Sinner alone on HC says a lot.
MichaelNadal
Bionic Poster
Racquet_smash
Hall of Fame
There is only one tournament where age for age Alcaraz clearly outdoes Nadal and that's 2008 to 2025 Us Open. And even then 2008 Nadal would have more than a good shot at winning this year's USO.
Nadal at 22 already showed the single most impressive major win of all times.
Nadal at 22 already showed the single most impressive major win of all times.
Hitman
Bionic Poster
That is subjective. Borg's 1978 run was even more impressive IMO, and he was 22 then also.
Racquet_smash
Hall of Fame
Not that it changes much either way.
Hitman
Bionic Poster
Nadal’s RG 2008 is more impressive than any Alcaraz slam win IMO. Just not all time best.
manley0702
Semi-Pro
Alcaraz: He'd be the favorite at 3/4 slams. If Nadal were losing to Federer on hard court slams, he'd have an argument, but that wasn't the case. He was getting beat by Ferrer, young Murray, Gonzalez, and young Tsonga pretty easily (none of those matches went 5 sets). It's hard to make an argument that he'd beat Alcaraz on hard court at that point. Wimbledon is trickier because Nadal was good on grass, but his biggest weapon against Fed (heavy topspin to the backhand) wouldn't trouble Alcaraz. Nadal easily wins RG.
DSH
Bionic Poster
Totally wrong.
Don't forget that Alcaraz lost to Medvedev and especially to VDS (a lower category player than those you mentioned) in NY.
Alcaraz is playing in one of the worst eras of the open era and Sinner is not Djokovic or Federer on hard court, thus, the young Spaniard is experiencing a much lower level of competition than his older compatriot had years ago.
NoleFam
Bionic Poster
RG 2008? Why would that one be the most impressive of all time? One of the most dominant for sure but most impressive?
The Blond Blur
G.O.A.T.
Making the SF of the AO and USO isn’t going deep?
abmk
Bionic Poster
alcaraz is better on HC, but not miles better.
alcaraz hasn't even made the semi at the AO till now, nadal did in AO 08
alcaraz obviously has significant edge at the USO.
nadal also won Madrid indoors in 2005.
alcaraz has been worse indoors given whole tournaments (USO 25 final was one match - not whole tournament)
nadal also won Canada 05, dubai 06, IW 07, Oly 08 ...
Edit: While Alcaraz has done excellent vs Sinner on HC, he is also 1-3 vs djoko on HC. His competition is way worse than nadal's
The Blond Blur
G.O.A.T.
Hitman
Bionic Poster
As an opinion sure. As irrefutable fact, no.
NoleFam
Bionic Poster
I would even question that opinion, lol.
Hitman
Bionic Poster
Me too. But still. Lol
Everybody assumed that Fed was the top of the tops in early 00's. He was the top player then, but I'm not so sure he was world beater then. Because at that time, all he had was Nadal, and for years he couldn't beat outside of Wimbledon.
I think Carlos would run into the ground!
The Blond Blur
G.O.A.T.
Clearly @Racquet_smash was referring to the level of play displayed at RG08.
NoleFam
Bionic Poster
Yea I look at the "most impressive" as being different than the most dominant. I would say Del Potro's 2009 USO win was more impressive than that one for starters, for a few reasons.
StrongRule
Talk Tennis Guru
How about you tell us what makes a slam win impressive for you.
NoleFam
Bionic Poster
The draw is one factor; or the likelihood of you winning (underdog); or the level of play you performed at; or all of the above. If you win a Slam over elite dominant competition in a tough draw when no one expects you to win, I give you extra kudos for that one.
dking68
G.O.A.T.
Agreed which is why I didn’t put a prediction for Nadal against Alcaraz. For the other 3 matches I put NadalI also don't think it's fair to compare their performances at the US Open at the same age.
While Nadal arrived very tired to compete in the US Open, Alcaraz arrived fresh to the same GS tournament, both 22 years old.
Nadal had just played in the Olympic Games and despite this, he reached the semifinals, losing a 4-set match to one of the two (or three) best versions of Murray in NY.
Without that handicap, he would have fought for the title and would have had a good chance of winning it.
We saw what happened to Alcaraz the season he played the US Open after competing in the Olympic Games in Paris; it didn't go well for him at all.
dking68
G.O.A.T.
More like 10-0ROFLMAO.
tennis_pro
Bionic Poster
Alcaraz lost to Berrettini, Zverev and Djokovic. Nadal lost to Hewitt, Gonzalez and Tsonga. I dont see a huge difference, in fact Id give Alcaraz the nod.Carl lost to Berrettini
Also Alcaraz has clearly underperfomed at the AO while Nadal in 2005-2008 just wasnt near as good as a young Alcaraz on HC.
StrongRule
Talk Tennis Guru
Probably without dropping any sets.
dking68
G.O.A.T.
Sinner literally could’ve beaten the Spaniard in straights in the 2025 RG F, I can’t imagine what 2008 Nadal would’ve done
The gap should be much larger at both RG and Wimbledon imo. More like 18-2 Nadal on aggregate at the natural surface Slams.
Though, I agree Carlos is probably a bit better on HC than Rafa at this age, Nadal definitely had not shown a USO 25 level at a HC Slam yet in his career.
dking68
G.O.A.T.
I say 10-0 at RG
8-2 or 9-1 at Wimbledon
At the USO, I don’t like to compared Rafa to Raz because Rafa entered the 2008 USO like a dead horse after all the tennis he played that summer - he won RG, Queens, Wimbledon, Olympic Gold, Toronto, deep run in Cincy
The Blond Blur
G.O.A.T.
Dude you’re literally the guy who memed RAFA for beating Berrettini…and Carl lost to him. And the losses to Zedrot and Joker weren’t any better than the losses to Gonzo and especially Tsonga. Zedrot is notorious for sucking against top 10 players in schlems and Ancientovic was out there playing on one leg, and would go on to retire the very next round. If anything by downplaying Hewitt, Gonzo, and Tsonga you’re saying Fedovic’s HC opponents weren’t that tough.
abmk
Bionic Poster
Alcaraz opponents at AO were significantly worse and its not even close.
Hewitt was in his best run at the AO.
Gonzo and Tsonga were on fire and played the best tournaments of their lives - atleast at a slam.
berr is BerrLOL.
zverev played good, but still clearly below any of the 3 nadal opponents
and 38+ djokovic retired next round. clearly worse than any of 3 nadal opponents.
Hawaiian grip
Professional
Neither had Rafa until the 2009 AO.
abmk
Bionic Poster
unignored this page for a minute and came across this joke.
poor guy is so delusional he actually believes it. God bless him with a +ve IQ.
Racquet_smash
Hall of Fame
22 games left from R4 to final given the opposition has no competition besides Borg 1978 who has an easier draw overall.
DSH
Bionic Poster
Nadal vs. Alcaraz at RG; 64, 62, 60.
Nadal vs Alcaraz at Wimbledon 75, 46, 63, 62 at Wimbledon.
Jav
Semi-Pro
You guys underestimate Carlitos on grass just because of his recent Wimbledon final. He's got the best grass W% in the whole OE, definitely his most winning and best surface at least compared to rest of tour's. He has 2 Wimbledon and Queen titles. 21-19 overall Nadal is not the boldest of claims though, could generally agree with it. It would definitely be tight.
He gets it.
AO: The other way around .
RG: 10-0.
USO: 7-3 Alcaraz , only because Nadal arrived in NY in a physically compromised condition after playing in the Olympic Games in Beijing, something that did not happen to Alcaraz this season.
Only in Wimbledon is your deduction correct.
This is nonsense. Nadal had really not proven anything in Australia til at least 09 AO, one year later.
The thing with these prodigies is that one season can make a heck of a difference. See Carlitos' USO, with his different serve and BH.
If we're counting the whole seasons, as to where they'd be if you picked an average 2008 or 2025 example of them, then Alcaraz would probably play this Wimbledon better than he did against Sinner (tireness from Queens and Sinner just peaking there), same as Nadal would probably do at USO after his Olympics.
If, on the contrary, we only take their revealed performances (like September Alcaraz didn't play USO better than January Alcaraz would do) then of course we can take their dips in performances which are not representative of their overall-season's, because circumstances. Context play a huge role, and sample with youngsters who have just not played enough games is probably misleading as well. See the debate as to in which surface is Carlitos best, constantly shifting. It was natural after this RG, only clay after this W and apparently now he's an all-surface talent (realistically probably somewhere in the middle, that is, slight natural advantage).
Personally I don't think, as good as Nadal is on clay, that he'd win 10/10. If you're familiar with betting odds you'd realize 80-20 is already pretty generous. Any recent, peer (arguably) ATG margins equalized by age will always sit around 60-40. Anything more-less would already be surface advantage to one or the other. F.e., as far as I know 8-2 is the real Nadalovic h2h there, in RG. And it's arguably Novak's worst surface (beyond Nadal's influence on that).
So let's be real. Nadal then did not face rivals on clay like 25 Carlitos that often. And he's pretty comparable, if not better than the average Novak on clay (yes, despite the Olympics last season).
I'll give it as it follows (expectable performances aside circumstances):
- AO: Alcaraz 6-4? Most uncertain though
- RG: Nadal 8-2
- Wimbledon: 5-5
- USO: Alcaraz 6-4
DSH
Bionic Poster
It's Alcaraz who hasn't shown any outstanding level in Melbourne so far, Nadal would have the advantage.
Nadal would never lose to Alcaraz at RG if they will face each other at the same age.
At Wimbledon, Nadal would be superior to his young compatriot; the advantage wouldn't be much, but he would dominate there.
In NY, I agree with you, Alcaraz would have the h2h in his favor there but the difference wouldn't be as big as many here believe.
Jav
Semi-Pro
That's respectable, though I'd say probably a bit too biased imo and I naturally disagree. If 08 Nadal won 25 Carlitos 10-0 he'd have a better h2h against Novak than just 8-2 because I'd even go as far as to say no Novak version ever played on clay as well as Carlitos in last RG final (and that goes to Sinner's credit as well, though much to do with Carlitos being unclutch in the 1st set: that game came out closer than Carlitos would generally do there imo, probably around 7-3 vs Jannik there who honestly overperformed; see Rome).
As first reply said, we'll never know for certain though.
As first reply said, we'll never know for certain though.
At any point in time, anybody could win over anyone. The question is, how unexpected is that?Carl lost to Berrettini
Carlos is expected to win over Berrettini handily. So did Nadal and Federer!
NoleFam
Bionic Poster
What's wrong with Alcaraz losing to Berrettini 7-6 in the 5th at the AO when he was 18 years old and #31 in the world, and Berrettini was #7? You can say the Zverev loss was a bad loss because Alcaraz was ranked above Zverev and #2, plus he had won 2 Slams but I don't see how the Berrettini loss was bad loss.
Ok so you're basing it on most dominant and games lost? Fair enough.
StrongRule
Talk Tennis Guru
Well, if people here mention 2005 Nadal losing to Hewitt in a very close match then it is a fair comparison.
NoleFam
Bionic Poster
Neither of those are bad losses and neither one of them were expected to win at the time.
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