Nadal closes another excellent season taking Spain to its sixth Salad Bowl

Shapovalov's drive ran into the net and Rafael Nadal went to the ground. He had just closed one of the best seasons of his life. Champion of Roland Garros and the United States Open, fifth year as world number 1 at the end of the course and now Davis Cup champion. The Spanish team jumped onto the track and threw themselves on it, imprisoned on the floor between fervent hugs. The new Davis Cup blessed the host team after one last impressive game, with an opponent who hinted at the formidable future that awaits him. Led by Nadal, incombustible until the last ball, Spain won for the sixth time the Salad Bowl and promoted the revolutionary bill of a tournament still pending settlement. With the Magic Box full and a climate with the abundant doses of patriotic inflammation that usually distinguish the exceptional confrontations between countries in a sport of individual vocation, the great supporter of the team that captains Sergi Bruguera, the winner of eight of the 11 points in dispute and the most convinced defender of the Gerard Piqué project since its conception defeated a dignified Denis Shapovalov 6-3 and 7-6 (7), in one hour and 55 minutes and returned our tennis to the roof of the world.

Champion in 2000, 2004, 2008, 2009 and 2011, the Spain of Nadal regains power and is placed to a single title of Sweden, fifth in the championship ladder. Before, Roberto Bautista, reintegrated to the team after leaving him on Thursday due to the worsening of his father's health, who died hours later, got rid of Felix Auger-Aliassime 7-6 (3) and 6-3, to achieve one of the victories most exciting of his life and lay the first stone of the historic victory against Canada.

For the second time since this renewed edition of the Davis Cup began, Nadal had the opportunity to put the seal on a tie with his individual match, this time with the cup as a reward. He did it before Croatia, in the second match of the group stage, in which he then had the pleasure of playing the doubles, but Russia, Argentina and Great Britain had pushed their crossings with the host team to the limit after scoring the First point. The great architect of the presence of Spain in the final only needed this time to endorse the victory of Bautista, without resorting to the extension of the doubles.

A young man loaded with self-confidence

On the border, Denis Shapovalov, the kid who at only 18 years surprised him in the 1000 Masters of Canada, one of the members of the group nominated to renew the elite. The Tel Aviv-born tennis player has won this season in Stockholm and lost with Djokovic the final of the 1000 Masters in Paris-Bercy, frustrating his semifinal match due to Nadal's injury.

In his first Davis Cup final, he showed enormous determination, with clear concepts and always looking forward. He solved with a direct kick the first opportunity to break Nadal, in the fourth game, and at the next point he defined in the net with a reverse volley. Shapovalov does not shake his hand; whose attitude denotes that he has clear objectives. But, as usual, Nadal continued pulling the thread and found a prize in the sixth game. Victory was not going to be much easier. In a show of self-confidence, Shapovalov continued in the fight, pulling from both sides of the court and building plays that allowed him to approach the net. He came to have a 4-2 ball and serve, but Nadal was saved with a winning service. No one has broken him throughout the week.

The Canadian was equally perspiring a double fault to suffer a brutal passing of parallel drive with the break ball seal in the ninth game of the second set , with 4-4, than the intimidating scenario with 12,500 witnesses largely inclined by the host . He was in the best possible showcase and did not want to miss the opportunity to show his indisputable qualities. He had up to a set point after lifting two match balls. He succumbed to the third. He had to surrender to an almost invincible rival in this competition, where he has 29 wins and a single defeat in individual matches, in addition to the absolute record of 31 consecutive wins including doubles. And the story continues.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

• Rafael Nadal
• Davis cup
• tennis

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