brokenshoelace
Grand Slam Champion
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Don't want to be the guy who only shows up when his guy wins, but I haven't been following the smaller tournaments as much so there was really no reason to post. That said, it's been 14 years since Nadal won his FO title, and I think people still don't understand what constitutes a tough match-up for him on clay. Can't blame them, as there hardly is one, but if there is, Thiem isn't it.
Yes, he beat him 4 times on clay before. Alert the media. Let's get a few things clear:
There's Nadal on clay (an insanely difficult prospect), there's Nadal at Roland Garros (a near impossible prospect), and then there's Nadal in the Roland Garros final (a literally impossible prospect). So to me, beating him once a year in smaller events, while a notable feat, isn't necessarily indicative of much. So the first part you have to look at, beyond anything the opponent brings to the table, is Nadal himself. On the final Sunday, on Chatrier, as obvious as this sounds, he's a different animal.
Let's get a few things out of the way, there's plenty of misconceptions about what kind of game can trouble Nadal on clay, especially in his later years where, even though he doesn't move or defend quite as well as he used to (still does it better than anyone on this surface though), his aggression and overall approach in rallies is much more aggressive than it used to be.
1- Shotmaking, in the traditional sense, isn't necessarily the biggest aspect to beating Nadal. This is the biggest misconception to me. Yes, you need to come up with great shots to beat him. But if the best bet for someone to beat Nadal at RG is to hit amazing shots for 5 sets, then yeah, good luck with that. Firstly, very few players have that kind of execution/stamina/mental focus/etc...to do it for that long. Secondly, and more importantly, very few players will be in a position to hit those shots routinely. Take Thiem in the first set today, all the way up until he got broken at 4-3. He hit some incredible shots that anyone who's watched tennis before knew was not sustainable, simply because they happened in rallies where he had to hit about 2 amazing defensive lobs, track down a drop volley, and then come up with some insane pick up. That's not how you're going to beat Nadal. You most likely won't be good enough to keep doing that, and even though it will get to him for a little bit, it won't get to him to where he's going to over-hit or go for too much for the entire duration of the match. Never mind the fact that he's way too good at making tactical adjustments anyway, and that despite losing those points, he's the one dictating the rallies, and that's never a good thing for his opponent.
2- Great, penetrating RALLY ground strokes are far more important. Again, it's not about hitting winners. It's much more about every shot leading up to the winner. It's also much more about the forced errors. The kind of shots that force Nadal out of his comfort zone, to be on the run, to drop the ball short, etc... Soderling, in their infamous match, did hit some incredible winners, and definitely red-lined his game, but looking at that alone is way too narrow-minded. The correct thing is to look at what allowed him to pound those winners. Soderling stayed close to the baseline, got on top of the ball, and just pounded it from both wings. His cross court rally forehand did so much damage, as did the backhand.
That's the main difference between that, and Thiem. When you think of Thiem's best shots, what do you think of: Most likely, it's him camping on his backhand wing, running around the ball, and bludgeoning inside out forehands. Ok, how often is he going to do that against Nadal without sacrficing too much in terms of time, control and positioning? The biggest problem for Thiem is he can't put himself in that position often enough on his own terms. He stands too far back out on his backhand wing against Nadal (less so against guys who hit the ball flatter like Djokovic) and concedes too much space on the baseline. You're just not going to beat Nadal from that position, no matter how good of a shotmaker you are. Wawrinka couldn't do it and his backhand is more potent and has probably even more firepower at least from that wing., And even though Thiem is a better athlete and a much better mover than Stan, his movement shines when he's tracking down the ball on the run, rather than small footwork adjustments to put himself in a position to hit his inside out forehand (a la Federer or Nadal himself).
The other major, major problem for Thiem is that Nadal can go to his forehand wing without any big risk, and that's where the lack of a great rally forehand from that wing hurts him (rather than running around the backhand). Nadal's cross court backhand completely dominated Thiem's forehand, as Thiem's rally forehand isn't penetrating enough to cause damage (or even stretch Nadal on his backhand wing), nor is he good enough at consistently changing direction and fire it up down the line to keep Nadal honest and force him to think twice before going there. I actually think Nadal's cross court backhand was the shot that decided the match today (ignoring the part where he randomly somehow turned into Stefan Edberg at the net).
Again, taking Soderling's example, his ability to clobber his rally forehand was a major deciding factor in that infamous match. And of course, you have Nadal's eternal tough match-up on any surface, Djokovic, who does everything mentioned above extremely well. Again, despite the amazing rallies those two have, the insane gets, the movement, the athleticism, it is Novak's ability to hit great rally groundstrokes to open up the court or put Nadal on the backfoot that sets him apart from the rest.
3- I don't care how big Thiem's serve is in terms of speed, it is not nearly dominant enough. It doesn't win him enough cheap points against Nadal, period. This one is a very obvious problem that doesn't need a lot of explaining. Nadal returned very well today. but that's also largely a result of him not worrying about Thiem's service placement and variety, so he just stood far back and made sure he hit his return deep off the backhand side (where Thiem directed a very big chunk of his serves, showing some questionable tactics in the process).
4- Thiem's lack of a damaging return game. Again, another self explanatory one. Nadal was never under any real pressure on his second serves.
Ultimately, the problem for Thiem is Nadal is just too good at moving him around, and he's not good enough to dominate rallies against Nadal consistently. That's not a very good recipe. Sooner or later, Nadal was going to clean up his game and make some adjustments (despite the fact that he didn't play too cleanly) and all that moving around will tire anyone, let alone someone who's played 4 straight days.
Yes, he beat him 4 times on clay before. Alert the media. Let's get a few things clear:
There's Nadal on clay (an insanely difficult prospect), there's Nadal at Roland Garros (a near impossible prospect), and then there's Nadal in the Roland Garros final (a literally impossible prospect). So to me, beating him once a year in smaller events, while a notable feat, isn't necessarily indicative of much. So the first part you have to look at, beyond anything the opponent brings to the table, is Nadal himself. On the final Sunday, on Chatrier, as obvious as this sounds, he's a different animal.
Let's get a few things out of the way, there's plenty of misconceptions about what kind of game can trouble Nadal on clay, especially in his later years where, even though he doesn't move or defend quite as well as he used to (still does it better than anyone on this surface though), his aggression and overall approach in rallies is much more aggressive than it used to be.
1- Shotmaking, in the traditional sense, isn't necessarily the biggest aspect to beating Nadal. This is the biggest misconception to me. Yes, you need to come up with great shots to beat him. But if the best bet for someone to beat Nadal at RG is to hit amazing shots for 5 sets, then yeah, good luck with that. Firstly, very few players have that kind of execution/stamina/mental focus/etc...to do it for that long. Secondly, and more importantly, very few players will be in a position to hit those shots routinely. Take Thiem in the first set today, all the way up until he got broken at 4-3. He hit some incredible shots that anyone who's watched tennis before knew was not sustainable, simply because they happened in rallies where he had to hit about 2 amazing defensive lobs, track down a drop volley, and then come up with some insane pick up. That's not how you're going to beat Nadal. You most likely won't be good enough to keep doing that, and even though it will get to him for a little bit, it won't get to him to where he's going to over-hit or go for too much for the entire duration of the match. Never mind the fact that he's way too good at making tactical adjustments anyway, and that despite losing those points, he's the one dictating the rallies, and that's never a good thing for his opponent.
2- Great, penetrating RALLY ground strokes are far more important. Again, it's not about hitting winners. It's much more about every shot leading up to the winner. It's also much more about the forced errors. The kind of shots that force Nadal out of his comfort zone, to be on the run, to drop the ball short, etc... Soderling, in their infamous match, did hit some incredible winners, and definitely red-lined his game, but looking at that alone is way too narrow-minded. The correct thing is to look at what allowed him to pound those winners. Soderling stayed close to the baseline, got on top of the ball, and just pounded it from both wings. His cross court rally forehand did so much damage, as did the backhand.
That's the main difference between that, and Thiem. When you think of Thiem's best shots, what do you think of: Most likely, it's him camping on his backhand wing, running around the ball, and bludgeoning inside out forehands. Ok, how often is he going to do that against Nadal without sacrficing too much in terms of time, control and positioning? The biggest problem for Thiem is he can't put himself in that position often enough on his own terms. He stands too far back out on his backhand wing against Nadal (less so against guys who hit the ball flatter like Djokovic) and concedes too much space on the baseline. You're just not going to beat Nadal from that position, no matter how good of a shotmaker you are. Wawrinka couldn't do it and his backhand is more potent and has probably even more firepower at least from that wing., And even though Thiem is a better athlete and a much better mover than Stan, his movement shines when he's tracking down the ball on the run, rather than small footwork adjustments to put himself in a position to hit his inside out forehand (a la Federer or Nadal himself).
The other major, major problem for Thiem is that Nadal can go to his forehand wing without any big risk, and that's where the lack of a great rally forehand from that wing hurts him (rather than running around the backhand). Nadal's cross court backhand completely dominated Thiem's forehand, as Thiem's rally forehand isn't penetrating enough to cause damage (or even stretch Nadal on his backhand wing), nor is he good enough at consistently changing direction and fire it up down the line to keep Nadal honest and force him to think twice before going there. I actually think Nadal's cross court backhand was the shot that decided the match today (ignoring the part where he randomly somehow turned into Stefan Edberg at the net).
Again, taking Soderling's example, his ability to clobber his rally forehand was a major deciding factor in that infamous match. And of course, you have Nadal's eternal tough match-up on any surface, Djokovic, who does everything mentioned above extremely well. Again, despite the amazing rallies those two have, the insane gets, the movement, the athleticism, it is Novak's ability to hit great rally groundstrokes to open up the court or put Nadal on the backfoot that sets him apart from the rest.
3- I don't care how big Thiem's serve is in terms of speed, it is not nearly dominant enough. It doesn't win him enough cheap points against Nadal, period. This one is a very obvious problem that doesn't need a lot of explaining. Nadal returned very well today. but that's also largely a result of him not worrying about Thiem's service placement and variety, so he just stood far back and made sure he hit his return deep off the backhand side (where Thiem directed a very big chunk of his serves, showing some questionable tactics in the process).
4- Thiem's lack of a damaging return game. Again, another self explanatory one. Nadal was never under any real pressure on his second serves.
Ultimately, the problem for Thiem is Nadal is just too good at moving him around, and he's not good enough to dominate rallies against Nadal consistently. That's not a very good recipe. Sooner or later, Nadal was going to clean up his game and make some adjustments (despite the fact that he didn't play too cleanly) and all that moving around will tire anyone, let alone someone who's played 4 straight days.
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