Fifteen years after winning his first title in Rome after lifting two match points to
Roger Federer
in the final,
Rafael Nadal
put the double digits in the Foro Italico by beating
Novak Djokovic
7-5, 1-6 and 6-3 , after two hours and 49 minutes.
Ten times champion in Rome: 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2018, 2019 and 2021. Thirteen at Roland Garros, 12 at Conde de Godó and 11 at Monte Carlo, the other competitions where he handles with two figures.
Two weeks before the start of Roland Garros, where he will seek to exceed Federer's 20 greats, Nadal hits the table and is running again as the top seed. After a hesitant start to the tournament, where he had to overcome two
match points
in the round of 16 match against
Denis Shapovalov
, the Spaniard has regained his best tennis with the same fundamentals as always, to which were added his exceptional performance with the service in the first set. He achieved his thirty-sixth Masters 1000, thus equaling Djokovic at the top of that ranking.
After the four hours and 56 minutes it took on Friday to complete his quarter-final match against
Stefanos Tsitsipas
and break
Lorenzo Sonego's
stubborn resistance
in the semi-finals, Djokovic came out with the intention of cutting short the points.
There was no room for contemplation between two players who know each other more than well after 56 games, the most fruitful rivalry in tennis history.
In three games, they had already broken the service.
Long-lived
It was the final between the two oldest tennis players since the professional era (1968) and the second with the longest ages in tournaments of this category since 1990. A sample of the consistency of both, of how they have been able to maintain their competitive strength with the passage of time, is the fact that they starred in 2007, in Indian Wells, the second final among younger players. So Nadal, 20, beat the 19-year-old Serbian.
Nadal put a very high price on each point. Djokovic was looking for the lines, he opened angles with his backhand, but wherever he put the ball, the long shadow of the Spaniard appeared, who also knew how to take the initiative and dominate with the
drive.
In a dizzying run that culminated in a great
crossover
passing
with the award for the
finally unconverted
break
ball
, in the seventh game, he slipped and went to the sand. "The lines. The whole bloody day. We're going to kill each other at the end!", He rebuked the chair umpire,
Carlos Bernardes
, very angry about an endemic problem throughout the tournament.
Two serious errors by Djokovic led to a second break of service.
He double-faulted and then hit a single right at the net, putting Nadal in a position to serve to win the first set, which he got to the second option.
Unlike the first set, Djokovic did know how to endorse the break at the beginning of the second.
The percentage of success of the Spanish with the service fell and the Serbian was invited to continue in a fight that he was tempted to abandon.
Nadal declined surprisingly after a splendid first set, full of success and determination.
The game was even when it seemed that
Nole
could weigh all the work he had on and the effect of being at a disadvantage.
It was he who had two chances to go in the third, with two options to go 3-2 and serve.
He did not make them profitable and he paid it in the next game, which the Spanish won the rest in white.
Sufficient harvest to close the final with his serve, in a convincing match where a truce was even allowed in the second set.
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Know more
Rafael Nadal
Novak Djokovic
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