For now, if he keeps winning and keeps
performing the way he did during his monumental quarterfinal victory over
longtime rival Novak Djokovic that began in May and ended in June, Nadal will
have more chances to play.
With a mix of brilliant shot-making and his
trademark resilience, Nadal got past the top-seeded defending French Open
champion Djokovic 6-2, 4-6, 6-2, 7-6 (4) to move a step closer to his 14th
championship at the clay-court Grand Slam tournament and what would be a 22nd
major trophy overall, adding to records that he already owns.
“One of those magic nights for me,” Nadal
said.
For anyone lucky enough to be there, too —
provided they were able to stay awake — or even anyone watching from afar. The
match began a little past 9 p.m. Tuesday and concluded more than four hours
later, after 1 a.m. Wednesday.
“TV decides,” Djokovic said about the late
start. “That’s the world we are living in.”
The bracket said this was a quarterfinal,
yes, but it felt like a final, from the quality of play to the quality of
effort, from the anticipation that preceded it to the atmosphere that enveloped
it.
The only missing ingredient: There was no
trophy handed to the winner.
Nadal turns 36 on Friday, when he will face
third-seeded Alexander Zverev in the semifinals. When the subject of Nadal’s
future was brought up during his on-court interview, he smiled.
“See you, by the way, in two days,” Nadal
said. “That’s the only thing that I can say.”
It’ll be difficult for any match the rest
of the way to live up to this one.
Nary a game, a point, a stroke or, indeed,
a step came with a hint of insouciance. Both men gave their all. Nothing came
easily.
Nadal’s 3-0 lead in the second set did him
no good; Djokovic ended up taking it and would say later, “I thought, ‘OK, I’m
back in the game.’”
But Djokovic’s 3-0 lead in the fourth did
him no good, even though he served for it at 5-3, even standing one point from
forcing a fifth twice. Nadal saved those set points and broke there, then ran
away with the closing tiebreaker, seizing a 6-1 edge and and never losing focus
after his first three match points went awry.
“I lost to a better player today,” said
Djokovic, who had won 22 sets in a row until the 49-minute opener against
Nadal. “Had my chances. Didn’t use them. That’s it.”
This showdown was their 59th, more than any
other two men have played each other in the Open era. Nadal narrowed Djokovic’s
series lead to 30-29 while improving to 8-2 against his rival at Roland Garros.
Nadal is now 110-3 for his career at the
place. Two of those losses came against Djokovic, including in last year’s
semifinals. This time, Nadal made sure Djokovic remains behind him in the Slam
count with 20. Nadal broke their three-way tie with Roger Federer at that
number by capturing the Australian Open in January, when Djokovic was not able
to play because he had not been vaccinated against COVID-19.
Before Nadal advanced to his 15th semifinal
in Paris, Zverev reached his second in a row by holding off 19-year-old rising
star Carlos Alcaraz 6-4, 6-4, 4-6, 7-6 (7).
“Not really getting easier from here,”
Zverev said after putting an end to Alcaraz’s 14-match winning streak.
“I told him at the net, ‘You’re going to
win this tournament a lot of times, not just once,’” said Zverev, the runner-up
at the U.S. Open in 2020 and the gold medalist at the Tokyo Olympics last
summer. “I hope I can win it before he starts ... beating us all.”
In women’s action Tuesday, 18-year-old
American Coco Gauff and 28-year-old Martina Trevisan of Italy reached their
first Grand Slam semifinals. The 18th-seeded Gauff beat 2017 U.S. Open champion
and 2018 French Open runner-up Sloane Stephens 7-5, 6-2, while the 59th-ranked
Trevisan eliminated U.S. Open finalist Leylah Fernandez 6-2, 6-7 (3), 6-3.
The nightcap was saved for two players who
know each other so well. The tendencies and tactics. The mannerisms and moods.
So it should come as no surprise they
engaged in points so involved, so lengthy — 57 of at least nine strokes, with
one that went 25 — that before some were concluded, folks in the stands would
let out a gasp or an “Aaaah!” or “Awwww!”, drawing rebuking hisses of “Shhhhh!”
in response.
Chair umpire Damien Dumusois might have set
a record, were such records kept, for most times saying “S’il vous plait,” to
plead with spectators to settle down and allow play to continue.
Nadal heard far more support in the form of
yells of “Ra-fa!” or “Vamos!” or “Te quiero!” Only once Djokovic began to
assert himself in the second set was his nickname “No-le!” heard with any
frequency.
As time passed and the air became colder —
below 60 degrees Fahrenheit (15 Celsius) — Nadal and Djokovic embodied the
words in clay-colored capital letters in French and English along the facing of
the lower level of the arena, attributed to Roland Garros, the World War I
fighter pilot for whom the facility is named: “Victory belongs to the most
tenacious.”
In the early going, and down the stretch,
it was Nadal getting the better of the baseline back-and-forths, pushing and
pulling Djokovic this way or that, up and back, until an opening for a clean
winner presented itself. Djokovic reacted to his miscues by rolling his eyes,
shaking his head or putting his palms out as if to say, “What’s going on?”
Nadal showed zero signs of being slowed or
bothered one bit by the chronic pain in his left foot that flares up every so
often and kept him off the tour for the last half of 2021 and arose again
before the French Open.
Nor did Nadal betray a trace of fatigue
from his five-set tussle against No. 9 seed Felix Auger-Aliassime in the fourth
round on Sunday that lasted 4 hours, 21 minutes, nearly twice as long as
Djokovic’s matter-of-fact win that day.
“I’m not surprised at all,” Djokovic said.
“It’s not the first time that he is able, a few days after he’s injured and
barely walking, to come out 100% physically fit.”
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