We were in Rafael Nadal territory today, a territory that he had carved out for himself, a territory that he wasn’t ready to give up.
Thiem was the biggest challenger to Nadal’s little land of ‘clay brilliance’, and while on his day he could match Nadal shot for shot, he couldn’t quite match Nadal’s mental strength, one that he had acquired over 12 long years in Paris.
11 titles, 11 grand slam titles at a single event, 11 instances of proving all the naysayers wrong; Rafael Nadal just pushed the entry point of his own territory a little further away from any Tennis player in the world(past, present or future).
In what turned out to be a rather one-sided encounter, Rafael Nadal brushed aside the challenge of Dominic Thiem in straight sets to lift his 11th(yes 11th) French Open title.
The first set was pretty intense, as Thiem matched Nadal shot for shot from the baseline. The only issue from Thiem’s perspective was that he couldn’t find those angles on important points and Nadal was a little better with his drop shots.
The second and third set though were all Nadal, with Thiem coming up with bouts of ‘good play’ but he just couldn’t keep hitting those balls with enough fizz for a sustained period of time.
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