Rafael Nadal will continue his bid for the Shanghai title when he takes the court on Saturday. Standing in Nadal’s way of the final is Juan Martin Del Potro.
Rafael Nadal and Juan Martin Del Potro will be squaring off for the 12th time in their careers when they do battle in the semifinals of the Shanghai Rolex Masters on Saturday night.
Nadal leads the head-to-head series 8-3, including 4-3 on hard courts. They most recently faced each other earlier this season in the title match at the Indian Wells Masters, where Nadal prevailed 4-6, 6-3, 6-4. Del Potro has not gotten the best of this matchup since his famous 6-2, 6-2, 6-2 destruction of the Nadal in the 2009 U.S. Open finals.
The Argentine has gone three full years without capturing a second Grand Slam title, but he is healthy at the moment and clearly on top of his game. Del Potro beat Milos Raonic in last week’s Tokyo final and so far this week he has dismissed Philipp Kohlschreiber (in a third-set tiebreaker) and Nicolas Almagro in addition to getting a walkover from Tommy Haas. The world No. 5 boasts a 42-12 record for the season.
“I played very well today, very solid,” Del Potro said after rolling over Almagro 6-3, 6-3 on Friday. “I played aggressive. I hit my forehand very well. I like the way I played today. I just want to keep improving; keep going far in this tournament.”
In order to do that, the underdog will have to upset the No. 1 player in the world and odds-on favorite to finish 2013 in the top spot. Nadal’s 68-4 mark includes 29 wins in 30 hard-court matches, with the only blemish coming in last week’s Beijing title match against Novak Djokovic. The Spaniard booked his spot in the Shanghai semis with straight-set scalps of Alexandr Dolgopolov, Carlos Berlocq, and Stanislas Wawrinka.
Last week gave Djokovic a chance to avenge his U.S. Open setback and impending loss of the top ranking to Nadal. This week Nadal is playing more inspired, perhaps driven to turn the tide from Beijing. Del Potro may be able to serve his way to a tiebreaker, but Nadal’s one-two, serve-forehand punch is working to perfection in Shanghai and he should have too much in the tank both physically and mentally for the sixth seed.
Pick: Nadal in 2 with at least one tiebreaker
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Don’t count on Delpo following up today with a win tomorrow. The normal thing will be for him to have an emotional let down. Remember, he was playing to secure WTF 2013 today. Of course tomorrow he will be playing for his maiden Masters but he has another shot at that in Paris this year.
I don’t count on it at all, but it would be greatly appreciated from this Rafafan 🙂
Plus, I really like Delpo, and felt bad for him, when he lost IW to Rafa. He deserves a Masters title.
I will be rooting for Delpo too. The sooner Delpo gets to the top 4 the better, he is too dangerous to be floating around waiting to ambush some poor unsuspecting top player in an early round. Yes he has a Slam but he really needs some Masters trophies as well to his name to have real gravitas.
deucy@:October 12, 2013 at 5:51 pm
—Nole! Nole! Nole!—
Your wish is understandable. If Delpo wins tomorrow, he’ll be only 370 points behind Andy Murray in the ATP rankings when they are updated on Monday.
True, but I also really like Nole 🙂 JMDP is not for me. I’m with nadline on these tennis “giants.”
As usual, Juan Jose at changeovertennis.com does a BRILLIANT job of deconstructing the Rafa/Delpo match;
http://www.changeovertennis.com/key-points-analysis-del-potros-brilliant-execution-rafael-nadal-shanghai/
This is where the match was won and lost:
Set 1:
Delpo Key Points won: 11
Rafa Key Points won: 7
Set 2:
Delpo Key Points won: 12
Rafa Key Points won: 9
Rafa never recovered from the smothering Delpo did in the 1st set…………….
Rafa needs some Mallorca R & R! Hope he can summon up sufficient energy to wrap up that YE#1.
Vamos Rafa!
RT @juanjo_sports: “Can’t get this out of my head: Delpo is into his 3rd M1000 final ever (0 titles). To get there he beat Nadal, who’s won 5 M1000s in 2013.”
#Perspective
I love hearing from Rafa himself after his matches. I read the transcript of his post-match presser on vb today. I always feel so much better. He has things in perspective. I think he knows that he did not play his best. He said that he could have served better. But I don’t think he wanted to take anything away from Delpo who played outstanding tennis.
Rafa’s comments show that he is okay with this loss, feels that he did the best he could on that day but that Delpo was just too good. He is happy with a final and a semifinal result.
Of course, I would love to see Delpo win for a few reasons, not just the obvious one that it would make Rafa’s attempt to secure the #1 ranking a bit easier. I also would like to see him win his first Masters. He has seemed to be so close this year to getting back to his best. Rafa did speak about that in his presser. He thinks that this is the best Delpo has played. But something always seems to derail his progress. He had a respiratory infection that forced him to withdraw from RG. Then he had knee problems at Wimbledon, but still got to the semis and pushed Djoker to the limit before losing. The USO was a disappointment because of his wrist acting up.
I think Delpo wants to move up into the top four and have a shot at winning a slam next year. We will see if Rafa, Murray and Djoker can keep up the monopoly at the slams.
It can only be a good thing for the health of tennis to have a group of players capable of regularly challenging the current triumverate.