How long can Ferrer hold him at bay?
As Rafa has nearly all the clay points to defend the earliest possible seems WImbledon, where Nadal defends R2 and Ferrer defends a quarter, but that seems like a stretch unless Ferrer misses it or Rafa wins it.
Depends on the clay season, if Rafa defends it all and is fit to play the hard court season, and does relatively well (better than Ferrer), the should clinch it sometime after USO.
I voted By Wimbledon because I want it to come truth,but I'm actually not that optimistic anymore given his recent complaints about the knee and his too busy new schedule.
It`s tough to say,really.A lot deppends on how well he plays but also on his schedule.When he comes back,he might not play all his scheduled events.After such a big layoff,he doesn`t know how his body will feel after playing 1 or 2 competitive events,so cutting some events of his schedule is always possible.
Also,i doubt his goal is to get back into top 4 right now.For someone who hasn`t played in 6-7 months,it`s about getting into some rhythm and play as well as possible without thinking of rankings and other stuff.
If you look here: http://www.menstennisforums.com/showthread.php?t=224329 you can see that Ferrer is about 3000 points ahead when considering only points gained from the start of RG 2012 until now, so it looks unlikely until after Wimbledon unless Ferrer hardly picks up any points in the next few months.
If he doesn't defend his RG title, and it might be a tough task if he gets a sick draw (having to beat top 3 in QF, SF and F) he will stay at number 5 for a while...
No, I meant by Wimbledon, as in going into the tournament. This is very unlikely considering the points they defend, but definitely not impossible, as Nadal seems to be playing at lot of the tournaments Ferrer won last year in South America. Also Ferrer is over thirty and may not defend many points for a number of reasons. Again this I think it's unlikely but many people apparently don't.
I for one don't see it happening this year tbh, unless Ferrer gets some unlucky draws.
This would still require Nadal to slightly improve his points from last year before W and then reach the W final, if Ferrer matches his points until but not including W.
It's interesting several posters think he won't be impeded by the absence at all. It would make him the first male player ever to come out from such a long break all cylinders firing.
It will depend on whether he comes back without any health problems or injuries. Even now after eight months off, he says his knees still hurt. I don't see much future in that, unfortunately. :shrug:
Clearly being out from the game for what...over six months (?) is not great. But players like Roddick played with tendinitis throughout their careers - he lasted until he was thirty before calling it quits.
So it's not impossible to see Nadal getting back to some kind of form, even if he has to continue to play with the pain.
Edit: I just checked Roddick's ranking history - dropped out of top four never to return in 2007 (he must've been about 25). So maybe you're right. Obviously, I appreciate that there are some major differences in Nadal and Roddick's games, etc...
I personally think Nadal will never be the same again. He's not going to overload his body on so many tournaments, which means he could possibly be gone from the top 4 forevermore.
I voted "by the US Open" trying to be positive, but I think it's more realistic to bet "by the end of the year", when Ferrer loses his points from Bercy and so on ...
Nadal still has 4000 points to take back from Ferrer (only 2500 points from Federer) for the seeds for the US Open.
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