Before 2012, grass was widely considered to be Nadal's second best surface, ahead of hardcourt. But now, after consecutive early round losses at Wimbledon, do you think otherwise?
No. Hardcourts are still his worst surface. Rafa's best winning percentage after FO is Wimbledon, and his worst is USO which is not surprising considering the speed and play of the surfaces. Rafa moves quite well on the grass, he was definitely the second best mover for a long time behind Federer on the surface. Yes he struggled quite a bit over the past half decade during the first week (Muller, Kendrick, Soderling, Haase, Petzschner and then Rosol) but notice all of these are big servers which are always a nightmare to play against especially on fresh grass. But even then, he was still winning. His Wimbledon preparation the last two years have been quite poor and his scheduling continues to put unnecessary strain on him which is most evident off clay because of all the defending he has to potentially do on faster surfaces and now it has caught up to him whereas in previous years he was mentally strong enough to get through these types of rounds.
Still this surely. His defeat to Darcis was due to poor tactics and a beat up body, not ineptitude on the surface. Darcis playing very fine all court tennis and not choking sealed his fate.
no, it is too early to say that... prob best to keep on using the * and the ** and the *** to denote sore, very sore or holiday time sore for these results...
Why would indoor hard courts be difficult for Nadal? I think it is more about the time of year, mostly late in the season, when Rafa is physically burnt out is the reason he does poorly on those courts.
Somehow I am more pessimistic about this than you guys. I don't think it's just about the surface.... if Nadal disappears for another 7 months, we will have more evidence to make a real conclusion
Wimbledon is his good slam - but thanks to conditions like best of 5, slower grass round by round and so on, but generally speaking right now grass is his worst surface for sure - HC - there is normal bounce he play on HC many matches, because it is major surface and not matter slow, fast, even indoor HC he is top 10 on it - howewer fresh grass - i say Nadal is not even top 20 give him at Queens or Halle R1 when grass is fresh vs many players he will loose,because they will simply outhit him outserve him.
It looks great, but is just 11 matches so not much to tell about his grass skills, i think he can play on grass his movement is great, he can slice- both serve and groundstroke, but his records are great thanks to other factors - like Wimby 2nd week best of 5 match on slow grass vs top guys.
I say let´s Roger play Rafa in Halle or Queens R1 on fresh grass and Rafa won´t win signle match from 10. That´s guy with match-up disadvantage, let´s Rafa take on Tsonga, Gulbis on fresh grass best of 3 match he won´t stand a chance.
I agree that Nadal is very prone to early round upsets on grass and that's why his Top-10 record on the surface may be misleading. It will be interesting to see what his Wimbledon strategy is gonna be in the future.
I think he'll do better on the outdoor fast HC (USO swing) than most people think.
It's not really the speed, but the height of the bounce that troubles Nadal. Sad to say, the guy probably just can't bend his knees low enough anymore.
No. Nadal is the twin brother of Borg on grass with 5 straight finals and two victories. It would have been five straight victories like Borg if his opponent in three of those finals was Roddick.
Conclusion 1: Grass is not his worst surface.
Conclusion 2: Nadal has no worst surface. He is a champ who finds a way to win on any surface.
Conclusion 3: His poor record at Indoors is due to the season end physical and mental fatigue. Anyone who wins that much on clay and puts up DOUBLE the amount of work than anyone in the field in first half is bound to get fatigued.
So everybody can play whole season and every season, only Nadal "the great champion" needs to play with double effort and then to finish seasons earlier and to occasionally go to long vacations?
That's only his problem... This is why he will never be the GOAT and this is why Novak will be #1 longer. And if Rafa continues like that, even 12 - 6 advantage in slams will melt
No. Even if you haven't watched much tennis before 2011, his results over big serving Gulbis, Ancic, Muller, Kendrik, Fish and others he took down at Wimbledon in the first/second round should provide you some idea. He also defeated Karlovic at Queen's.
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