Rafael Nadal has spent most of his career in history’s waiting room. By the time the Spaniard won his first grand slam at Roland Garros in 2005, Roger Federer already had four. Over the next 16 years, Nadal became not only the king of clay but also the king of catch-up, slowly reeling in his Swiss rival until he finally drew level with him on 20 majors at the French Open in 2020. No sooner had he done so than Novak Djokovic drew up a seat at the sport’s top table, winning three successive slams to take his own tally to 20.
Nadal does not much care for records and statistics. It is passion for the game that drives him, and rarely has that quality been more in evidence than over the five hours and 24 minutes it took to subdue Daniil Medvedev 2-6, 6-7 (5-7), 6-4, 6-4, 7-5 and claim his second Australian Open title. Like it or not, he now holds his own unique place in the record books as the first man in history to win 21 majors.
That he achieved the landmark at Melbourne Park, the scene of so many disappointments in previous years, only added to the welter of emotions as Nadal steered a final volley beyond Medvedev’s despairing reach. As he looked up towards his box in grinning disbelief, the fact that he had become only the second player in the open era to win all four slams twice will have been the last thought on his mind. It is only a few weeks since Nadal wondered if the chronic foot injury that forced him out of the game for six months might end his career once and for all. When he did finally return, he was almost immediately rendered hors de combat by a debilitating bout of Covid, raising serious doubts about him even travelling to Australia. In the circumstances, a second Australian Open title to stand alongside his 2009 triumph must rank among the Majorcan’s greatest achievements. At the age of 35, he is celebrating his 21st.
“For me, it’s amazing to achieve another grand slam at this moment of my career,” said Nadal, the sixth seed. “It just means a lot to me. Of course, I know it’s a special number, 21. I know what it means. It has big significance this title, no?
“Today is an unforgettable day. I never will say I deserve [it], because I think a lot of people fight and a lot of people deserve. But I really believe that I hold a very positive spirit. For the last six months, I really fought a lot to try to be back on court. There were very, very tough moments. Conversations, tough ones, because I didn’t know if I was going to have the chance to be back on the tour.
“I feel honoured. I feel lucky to achieve one more very special thing in my tennis career. I don’t care much if I am the best in history, not the best of the history. For me, it’s about enjoying nights like today. That means everything for me, no? It means more to achieve the second Australian Open, more than any other thing.”
It was a victory all the more remarkable for the fact that Nadal, understandably after so long out of the sport, was rarely at his best. Up against one of the game’s best returners, the Spaniard struggled to locate his first serve for long stretches. For two sets, he was subjected to the rare indignity of a relentless baseline bullying that, at times, left him looking lost. What followed should not have been possible. No one had ever won an Australian Open final after trailing by sets to love, let alone against a player 10 years their junior. That Nadal was required to endure the second-longest slam final in history to do so only made victory all the more special.
Medvedev looked crestfallen at the end, and with good cause. A 6ft 6in whirl of limbs whose unorthodox and sometimes ungainly style has earned him the nickname “the octopus”, the quirky Russian emerged as the disruptor-in-chief of the old guard when he beat Djokovic in the US Open final last September. Victory here would have made him the first man in the open era to claim his second major title immediately after his first, but his inability to make good on a two-set lead was a crushing blow. In the aftermath of defeat, his disappointment was palpable. Engaged in a running battle with the Melbourne crowd for much of the fortnight, Medvedev suggested the catcallers who interrupted his rhythm between first and second serves had killed his childhood dreams.
“From now on I’m playing for myself, for my family, to provide [for] my family, for people that trust in me, of course for all the Russians, because I feel a lot of support there,” said Medvedev.
“I’m going to say it like this: if there is a tournament on hard courts in Moscow, before Roland Garros or Wimbledon, I’m going to go there even if I miss Wimbledon or Roland Garros or whatever. The kid stopped dreaming. The kid is going to play for himself. That’s it. That’s my story.”
For all Medvedev’s despondency, his second gladiatorial showdown with Nadal in a major final is more experience in the bank for a player who looks more likely than any other to assume the mantle of the big three. At the US Open in 2019, the Muscovite fought back from sets down to force a fifth set; the roles were reversed here and, but for his inability to match Nadal physically, the outcome might have been too.
Medvedev had declared himself ready for a challenge of endurance, and was as good as his word. But having battled for almost five hours to defeat Felix Auger-Aliassime in the last eight before surviving a tetchy four-set battle with Stefanos Tsitsipas, his failure to drive home the early advantage inevitably took a toll. It was no surprise when he called for pickle juice, which triggers a reflex in the mouth known to stop cramping, midway through the contest. Yet such measures would probably have been unnecessary had he capitalised on a chance to break for 4-2 in the third set, when he had Nadal 0-40 down on serve.
“That was a good moment when I had the triple break point,” said Medvedev. “I made all three returns, just got a little bit tight. But, again, that’s tennis: should have done better, should have hit a winner, maybe I would have won the match.
“I feel like I was playing right, but Rafa stepped up. The only thing [was] that physically I was a little bit up and down. He was, I think, stronger than me physically today. Like starting from the third set, there were some shots and points where I was a little bit on the back foot, let’s call it like this. And Rafa takes control of these moments.”
For most of the first two and a half hours, it seemed highly unlikely that Nadal would be taking control of anything. All the talk beforehand was of the Spaniard, confronted by a younger man whose serve and return game are among the best in the business, needing to make a good start and deliver a commanding performance on serve. In the event, Nadal did neither, barely landing half his first serves in the first two sets as he racked up 36 unforced errors.
Even so, the traffic was not entirely one-way. In the fourth game of the second set, Nadal punctuated a 40-shot rally with an extraordinary angled sliced backhand to bring up two break points, the second of which he converted when Medvedev nudged a backhand long. Nadal could not maintain the advantage, however, missing a set point at 5-3 amid a sequence of three consecutive breaks that included a brief interruption when a protester ran on to the court bearing a banner with the slogan: “Abolish refugee detention.” The Spaniard squandered another 5-3 lead in the tiebreak and, when he faced break points in the sixth game of the third, it looked like his tilt at history was over.
“In that moment, of course, the situation was critical,” said Nadal, who had lost four of his previous five finals at Melbourne Park. “But sport is unpredictable, no? [Even] if you fight till the end, the normal thing is to lose the match in straight sets after that situation.
“I was repeating to myself during the whole match, I lost a lot of times here [after] having chances, sometimes I was a little bit unlucky. I just wanted to keep believing till the end. I just wanted to give myself a chance.”
Medvedev’s patience and ability to defend on the run repeatedly confounded Nadal’s initial efforts to dominate with his forehand and upset the Russian’s rhythm with his sliced backhand. Nadal did however get some joy by chipping the ball short down the line to Medvedev’s backhand, forcing the second seed to move forward from the deeper positions he prefers. As the match wore on, Nadal built on this tactic through frequent recourse to drop shots. Medvedev responded in kind, albeit not always with the same success. By then, however, Nadal was playing with greater fluency and aggression, his serving much improved and his backhand landing with greater venom and consistency.
As the contest entered a fifth set, Nadal lashed two huge forehand passes to fashion an early break point. Medvedev needed all his powers of resilience to survive, averting the danger with a courageous wrong-footing forehand before sealing the hold. But he was visibly tiring. The returns he had been making so consistently two hours earlier became elusive. The first serves that had been finding the lines with such unerring regularity began to misfire. As the Russian’s footwork slowed, errors crept in off the ground. With Medvedev running on fumes, Nadal sensed blood, racing on to a forehand to convert a break point in the fifth game.
Still the drama was not done. Serving for the match at 5-4, 30-30, Nadal stood within two points of history. But Medvedev bludgeoned his way to break point behind a barrage of heavy groundstrokes, and as Nadal prepared to serve on the next point he was warned for a time violation. A backhand error followed, and the contest once again hung in the balance.
After so many previous disappointments at Melbourne Park, Nadal’s ability to regroup in the next game – where he converted his third break point as a Medvedev forehand sailed long – was extraordinary.
“If we put everything together – the scenario, the momentum, what it means – without a doubt it was probably the biggest comeback of my tennis career,” he said.
Few would argue.