He is running out of time.
Nadal in Australia looked better than he looked ( in Australia that is ) for a while. And by very narrowly losing to Thiem he made himself a major service - he was not winning this tournament anyway, but another match could easily get him injured as 2-3 tough straight best-of-five matches on hard very often do to him recently.
This was he is healthy and is still a major odds on favourite to win RG. If Thiem choked it against flaking Nole today, holding its own against Nadal in Paris is next level of difficulty.
I see likely Nadal holding on in Paris for another year or two.
Thiem's chances at W are very small.
And on hardcourts Nextgen is better, plain better than him. This tournament was an anomaly, with most of Nextgen screwing things up primarily out of inexperience. This will happen less and less.
This tournament was a lucky break for Thiem. Him winning 5 tiebreaks in a row against very tough opponents was not only the evidence of his undoubtedly grown confidence and skills but also major luck. Even with one of those tiebreaks flipping chances are he'd be belly up before the finals.
And in finals.. Nole is not accustomed to maintaining perfect form for long. Especially at this age it's increasingly difficult. Novak had been masterful in last years at managing to peak for Slam's forthnight, especially in Australia, given the luxury of preseason preparation time. But this time he seemed to have done a worse job with that, expending energy in Davis/ATP Cup and clearly peaking up before the AO finals because of that. Which got him ( not as much Thiem's game ) on the ropes today, ckearly struggling physically.
And then Thiem made the same mistake Medvedev did against Wawrinka. Took a cornered and desperate lion for mortally wounded and doomed
He might not get that kind of lucky , easy chance again.
