Nadal, The New King And A Dangerous Legacy
Rafael Nadal is on course to become the winningest player of all time. With only 24 years old just get in New York the only title that was missing from his collection of the four majors that make up the Grand Slam.
Of course, that does not mean, as many mistakenly reported that the muscular Spanish has won a Grand Slam. A Grand Slam is what got the American tennis legend Don Budge in 1938. Something that matched and then surpassed the Australian Rod Laver, once as an amateur in 1962 and again in 1969 as a professional. That is, winning all four major tournaments, the Open Australia, France, Britain and the United States in one year.
I just made Nadal equals, in some ways, what they have done well (after Budge and Laver) Britain’s Fred Perry, Roy Emerson of Australia, the U.S. also Andre Agassi and Roger Federer. All of them have won at least four major, albeit in different seasons.
The last three, Nadal, Agassi and Federer have reached further into three different surfaces: clay, grass and hard courts.
Federer, who is still regarded as the best ever despite the evident superiority that Nadal has on him for some years (14-7 leads the Spanish official clashes between the two), was just added to the previous list last year when he won on clay at Roland Garros, on the outskirts of Paris. That was the tournament itself, for example, Pete Sampras could not reach, which conspired to make the U.S. will add to that list privileged.
Nadal has just won his ninth title in Grand Slam tournaments, which could be considered minuscule by comparing the mark with the record 16 having Federer or 14 which accumulated Sampras retired. But most shocking is that no Spaniard has achieved everything he has achieved at such a young age.
That astonished more when you consider that until now has shared his career playing in the same era of the Swiss, who also holds the record for 237 consecutive weeks at number one ranking of the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) for A total of 285 weeks in different periods, only one of Sampras in total.
“Now is the best in the world and has the talent to be the best ever,” said Novak Djokovik between resignation felt by the final defeat and his admiration for Nadal, who beat him at Flushing Meadows for 6 -4, 5-7, 6-4, 6-2 in a final that was completed on Monday due to rain delays.