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Rafael Nadal and his history with Wimbledon

The story of Rafael Nadal with Wimbledon It begins in 2003, when at the age of 17, in the first round, a specialist like Mario Ancic was ‘loaded’, a beginning that, sooner or later, anticipated a glorious end. The relationship of the Majorcan with the grass gives us a fascinating retrospective exercise, and serves as an infallible indicator to corroborate that the Spanish had authentic superclass wood and blood, and not those of a specialist like all his compatriots born in the 70s.

However, and for the greater interest of the narrative itself, Nadal had ups and downs with the most unique surface of all, protagonist and at the same time secondary of a sport that on the oldest surface of all becomes special and at the same time complicated to play, resulting enormously specific. Originally the ground that gave meaning to the discipline, on which all tournaments were played, was gradually displaced to the current point that no player forms their game in it. She goes to win the most important tournament in the world.

That is why when Rafa, already with a Roland Garros under his arm and being number two in the world, falls in the second round of Wimbledon 2005 against the Luxembourgian Gilles Müller, concluding that his game is not ready for the grass, with certain expectations that they hope the Balearic shine, it was the most sensible thing. His serve was very improvable, his game needed a meter more for the assembly of his blows while the swing to his right was too long and warped as to take time from the rival. So Rafa, a stubborn winner, began to discover himself only a year later.

From 2006 to 2011, with the exception of 2009, absent due to knee injury, we attended an electric player, a natural phenomenon to which the ball sounds like the Wimbledon champions should sound. The current world number 2 shows that he knows how to play short runs, with his foot on the line and with his hands forward. The grass, demanding floor that forces you to play flexed and put your wrist under the ball to redirect it or else the ball does not cross the net, the antithesis of clay, finds a devastating and hungry Rafa.

At full speed, Rafa Nadal is in those years a player just as vindicable as in his “earthling” version. It is not his nature, and that way of feeling the game on grass, due to different factors, he will later lose, but when he connected in those five years with the surface, the Spanish belonged to the aristocracy of the offensive game; vibrant with the backhand crossed, with the left foot in advanced and not behind, discovering delicacy in his hand to close volleys and with the intact essence of the best competitor under pressure of that time.

All this had and has an incredible merit because the surface requires the Majorcan to lose control of the point, forcing him to get into the eye of the hurricane of direct exchange, to a more exposed chest, in much more unstable and random terrain, especially with punches that during the dangerous first week they can condemn him to defeat.

A mixture of injuries and particular rivals will create and modify a deteriorated relationship of trust with a surface that will be denied and escaped season after season. In 2012 it would be Lukas Rosol, in 2013 the knees and Steve Darcis, in 2014 Nick Kyrgios, in 2015 Dustin Brown and in 2017 Gilles Müller, to add, with the absence of 2016, six years in a row without visiting the semifinals. All of them, profiles and rounds in which the lack of rhythm of the game, the formation of a very specific type of match and the confidence lost by those same successive defeats made Nadal one more player in the Cathedral.

However, Nadal has been able to reap fruits since Carlos Moyà took his bench, added more aggressive and age-appropriate methods to run less and hit more. Memorable semifinals against a reborn Djokovic and a superlative Federer a year later prevented Rafa from fighting again for a title he has not won since 2010 and for which he has not fought since 2011. Suspended the 2020 edition, Nadal will return to Wimbledon on his birthday. 35 years, a complicated age to guarantee great opportunities.

Whether or not that is possible, we are talking about a double Wimbledon champion, a five-time finalist, double Queen’s champion, first to get the Roland Garros-Wimbledon double since 1980, and by extension, in his best years, an exciting player when he came out. of his ropes to find the center of the ring and measure himself in the footwork and in the throwing of the hands. Nadal and the grass made history and so it will be written and recorded.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NL9hUhDtUcg

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