Rafael Nadal ready to reclaim Wimbledon crown
After spending the spring reasserting his dominance as the King of Clay, Rafael Nadal now turns his attention to reclaiming the Wimbledon crown that injury prevented him from defending in 2009.
It has to be said too, that the world No. 1 is in formidable form as he heads back to the scene of his historic victory in the final at the All England Club two years ago.
Then, Roger Federer was seeking to become the first player in the Open era to win six consecutive championships at the grass court Grand Slam, while Nadal was searching for his first major title away from Roland Garros.
For two years previously, Federer had denied the Spaniard in the final in SW19, though it took five sets and three hours and 45 minutes to do it in 2007, as Nadal edged ever closer to usurping the Swiss’ supremacy on the lawns in London.
In a classic Wimbledon final, the left-hander finally made the breakthrough in 2008, when in a four hour and 48 minute epic, the longest (measured in time elapsed) men’s final in the tournament’s history, Nadal claimed the 6-4, 6-4, 6-7(5), 6-7(8), 9-7 victory and the advantage in the battle to be recognised as the world’s best player.
A year later, however, a recurrence of Nadal’s knee tendinitis meant that when the time came to defend that title the Majorcan was unfit to do so. In Nadal’s absence, Federer reclaimed the mantle of Wimbledon champion and the 24-year-old enters the draw this year as one of two players who can claim to have been victorious in their previous match at Wimbledon, but the one in perhaps the stronger form of the two.
Three Masters 1000 titles on clay and the French Open capped a perfect European clay court season for Nadal, while a loss to Spanish counterpart Feliciano Lopez on grass in the quarter-finals of the Aegon Championships at London’s Queen’s Club proved Nadal is still beatable.
That loss to Lopez aside, Nadal fronted up to Queen’s serving and striking the ball as well on grass as on clay, and displaying some of that magic touch that made him unstoppable on dirt this year. He has every reason to be brimming with confidence as he heads to Wimbledon having regained both the French Open crown and the top spot in the rankings.
Nadal may not be returning to Wimbledon as defending champion, but he’s more than just another challenger to Federer’s crown: he’s once again the biggest threat to it, and could be just a couple of weeks away from denying the 16-time Grand Slam champion yet another Wimbledon title.
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