TENNIS Internazionali BNL d’Italia – R. Nadal d. A. Murray 1-6, 6-3, 7-5. An interview with Rafael Nadal
Q:Can you tell us your feeling when you was 6-1 down in the 1st set and 4-2 in the 3rd?
RAFAEL NADAL: With the 6-1 I didn’t feel I was playing bad, tactically probably not good, but my inside energy was better than yesterday, more positive attitude and my feeling was more positive than yesterday. Then I had some critical gam at the beginning of the 2nd set, he had break points, I touched the line and I was lucky. I feel I had to change something, I did, I went more to the net, waiting and be more patient. During the night the ball was slower, the bounces are lower, but at the same time I was playing against his back and he was having the control of my forehand and I was trying to analyse what was going wrong because I was feeling that I was not playing bad. So I was confident that if I had been able to change something I would have had the chances to come back in the match and to fight. Not thinking to win but to be competitive and then I had my chances: when I started to go to the net I gave him the doubt that he was not able to defend the higher ball, the slower, to create the winner and it gone well. And in the 4-2 in the 3rd I felt it was a little bit of lucky because at the beginning of the 3rd I was playing great: he played some great shot and I had some great shot too and I don’t know how he hit the ball on the cross…. Every victory is special but this one is important for me, against one of the best player of the world. He played well and is a victory that really means a lot to me. M spirit today was great and I really feel play 3 matches like this, after lose the 1st set and keep fighting is a great thing: my physic performance is going well and my mental part too. In my tennis if my mental part is good than my tennis want to be there, sooner or later and this was one of my best matches in a while and I am very happy for that It’s a great feeling to be in the semi-final after this game with Andy. This match gives me the power, the confidence, makes me feel alive. In my career I had a lot of matches of that style and always these kind of matches inside me gave a lot of power. (Andy, ndr) is already in tour for a while, and is always hard to come back from an injury but the important thing is that he’s able to practice well. He’s level is so high, never doubt about it, and will be one of the toughest opponent to beat. He had time to prepare, to adapt and today played a great match. Today when I had the chance to close the match I did it, even if I had three great point ahead of that, but then I closed it because I had that positive energy, I was thinking that I will do it and taking out all the negative thoughts I had the previous days. He’s quick (Andy, ndr) that’s why I played just two drop-shots, Fognini is one of the greatest player and it’s surprise that he beat him 64, 63, 63 and even if he made 15 drop shot the match wouldn’t be this way if Andy is fine, no way to beat him with that result. Probably Andy was not at his 100%. You can make some drop-shot against him, and that’s what I did, but the most important thing is to be in your favourite position to the side, if you are inside there’s no way you can try these kind of things.
