The grand slam remains a work in progress.
Three weeks after he looked unbeatable on the red clay of Roland Garros, Rafael Nadal, winner of the season’s first two majors, appears significantly more vulnerable so far on the manicured lawns of Wimbledon.
Nadal’s 6-4, 6-4, 4-6, 6-3 victory over Ricardas Berankis was a puzzling affair, his game flickering in and out of life like a pilot light in a tempest. For long stretches, he seemed a shadow of the player who won a 14th French Open title earlier this month to lift his tally of majors to 22. Forehands whistled long. Unforced errors piled up. His backhand, in particular, was inexplicable, the Spaniard favouring the one-handed slice over the two-handed drive so frequently that you almost began to wonder if he was perhaps trying to protect an injury, or trying to play the shot into form.
Every now and then, however, Nadal’s game clicked into gear. The forehand would suddenly acquire its signature bite and consistency. The serve would arrive with fresh venom. In the fourth set, in particular, Nadal’s groundstrokes were crisp and powerful, his movement sharp, his southpaw delivery wickedly accurate. But none of it ever felt entirely in his control and earlier, when the third set began to slip from his grasp following an early break, exasperation was writ large on his face.
Yet Nadal is slowly finding his feet on the surface, having not played at Wimbledon since 2019, and if he can continue to feel his way into the tournament without mishap then anything remains possible. The chronic foot injury that has so troubled him appears to have responded well to the radiofrequency ablation treatment he underwent three weeks ago, and Nadal’s quarter of the draw has opened up invitingly following the exit of sixth seed Felix Auger-Aliassime, whom he was scheduled to face in the last eight. The withdrawal of last year’s finalist Matteo Berrettini, who has Covid, has removed another potential stumbling block. For the moment, winning is all that matters.
“Not the best start, honestly, and probably the best finish,” said Nadal. “I finished playing well, the fourth set had been a good level of tennis for me, an important improvement. The rest of the things I have room to improve. But it was a victory in four sets, I spent three hours on court again, and that helps.”
The pattern of the contest was redolent of Nadal’s first round win over Francisco Cerundolo, who also won the third set. For two sets, Nadal lived dangerously, just about keeping his nose in front against Berankis, a tenacious and combative Lithuanian currently ranked 106th in the world but once as high as 50.
Having survived an early break point, Nadal broke at 5-4 in the opener, punishing an untimely double fault by Berankis that brought up two set points. The Spaniard fell behind almost immediately in the second set, failing to clear the net with a sliced backhand dink, and was still chattering agitatedly towards his box when he reclaimed the break in the sixth game. For all his consternation, however, Nadal once again made a decisive breakthrough at 5-4, although not before Berankis had fended off three set points in the face of some uncharacteristically passive play from the second seed.
Suitably emboldened, Berankis broke early in the third set. He had a point for a double break in the fifth game, saved by Nadal with a deep first serve, and at the next changeover the Spaniard sent off three rackets to be restrung. Apparently he was expecting a long evening, and when Berankis pulled off a stunning drop volley at full stretch to avoid going two break points down, it seemed he might be right. Having clumped a forehand winner to hold, Berankis went on to serve out the set, establishing a foothold in the match at exactly the same juncture Cerundolo had done.
This time, though, Nadal was ready. Against Cerundolo, he had fallen behind in the fourth set and looked in danger of being taken to a fifth. Here, he moved smoothly through the gears, racing into a 3-0 lead and shrugging off a fairly lengthy delay while the Centre Court turf was dried following an unexpected shower. Under a closed roof, Nadal saw out the victory to secure a third-round appointment with the 27th-seeded Italian Lorenzo Sonego.
“It’s important for me to accept that things are not perfect and just keep working, being humble and accept the challenge,” said Nadal in his on-court interview. “Just think positive things all the time, even when things are not going the best way possible, to be able to improve in the next couple of shots, games or sets.