Last Year, with Nadal losing out in the US Open, and the dearth of tennis sent me back into my shell for the rest of the year.   But here we are, in 2009, and the first Australian Open was a revelation again for my favorite player.  And here I am, after taking it all in, reading any article I could land my eyes on @atptennis.com, tennis.com, australianopen.com, espn.com, I am ready to grow out of my calm.  

Yes, I am a Nadal fan.  I am unapologetic, unashamed and unilateral about it.  I know there are a lot of Nadal fans out there, the fairer fans outnumbering the other sex (I am the other sex), so my fan-dom of this pickly matador from Spain has the danger of raising questions about my preference.  Questions about my private information aside, I still maintain that Raffa Nadal is my favorite player, and will remain my hope (not my expectation) to win the GrandSlam.  

"Where does Nadal appeal to you ?" "Where does he have the artistry of Roger or the compactness of the Djoker?"  "I can bet my life on Nadal not being as dominant as Roger has been" "The day I serve well, I will win against Raffa" "The day I destroy the arrangement of his bottles I will win against Raffa", you all say.  I agree with some of those.  Nadal is not the most artistic or most creative or most compact player around.  As someone said, with Roger, you see the economy of movement and flambouyance of artistry.  With Raffa its the other way round.  And add to that his quirks and idiosyncracies.  And his utterly uncomfortable, ceps-revealing attire!!!  But hey, forget about all the superficialities.  Take a look at his game again.  Flambouyance of movement, and economy of artistry.   The diametric end of Federer.  And who wins?  13-6 will give you the answer.

For all his genious, Federer over the last year or so, has shown that when he takes things for granted, he hasn't risen upto his own expectations.  Wimbledon 2007 was a close 5 set affair, that was defined by Rafa's 5 set mistakes as much as Federer's defiance to let go of his favorite trophy and turf.  If he had taken Wimby 2008 as his own, he was in for a teary awakening.  Now, Fed fans would argue that Wimby 2008 would have been his, if not for the fading light!  Wimby 07 would have been Rafa's if it was not for federer's saving break points at 2 all.  Wimby 2008 would have been a 4-set affair if only Federer's backhand had betrayed him like it usually does against Raffa.  My point is that the results are not random.  A champion doesn't arise by chance.  He / She takes their chances, and fights.  Points can be made by chance.  Not champions.

And that was on display during the Aussie Open 2009, too.  Could Federer have served well? Could he have run around his backhand and attacked the 2nd serves on breakpoint a little more? Could he have made lesser errors on his backhand and lesser errors on his forehand than his 64 unforced errors?  Sure, he could have done all that and more.  But that would also leave a chance for Raffa to play better.  Could Raffa not have run so much and ended points at the earliest oportunity (Well, he did that!!!).  Could Raffa... Well, I can't think of anything that Raffa could have improved.  If anything I wish he had played a shorter game on Friday.  But may be it was that match that gave Raffa the momentum.  May be it was the extra day that got Federer derailed.  May be Federer thought it was destiny that he would win his 14th GS at AO, no matter who was across.  May be Federer thought his forehands and backhands would magically work because he was destined to be legendary.  We would never know.  All we know was that whenever Fed had a great shot, Nadal had a greater reply.  Federer would be caught offguard and his next reply would suffer.  How many times have we played a shot that we thought was great and marvelled at it, only to see it come back, and return meekly!!!  A lot of times for me... :) And this where the flambouyant movement of Nadal negated the artistry of Federer.   Federer had always found it tough (in the past couple of years) against good counterpunchers (Andy Murray, Gilles Simon, Guillermo Canas).  And I think these guys have found their inspiration from Nadal.

At the end of the day, Federer was beaten not by his technique, but by the heart of Nadal. Because Nadal took nothing for granted.    He was there playing every point.  And Federer stopped playing at 2-1 in the fifth set.  He went for broke on his serve.  And lost.  And was heart broken. And this is where Nadal is better than Federer.