Historically, we can consider that Rafael Nadal (36) has two debts with tennis.
He has a debt with his service: he has never had a great serve, a problem that has prevented him from scoring what are called "free points".
And he also owes a debt to the Nitto ATP Finals, the Masters Cup.
Nadal has 17 appearances in the tournament that brings together the eight best rackets of the year. But, despite so many appearances (he is only surpassed by Federer, with 18), his balance is lower. Weighed down by his eventual physical problems, usually a torment at the end of the course, Nadal has only played two finals, in 2010 and 2013.
And that's it.
He has never won the tournament, who would say when we talk about the tennis player of the 22 Grand Slams, the colossus of the fourteen titles at Roland Garros, and the Olympic titles, and the Davis Cups.
It is true, Nadal's service has taken a leap in quality in the last four years, from the moment Carlos Moyá took over and changed directions and speeds. Since then, Nadal serves better. It has a variety of registers, a color palette, balls that open up and draw sensational parabolas, and others that stick to the T. Without going any further, this Sunday he collected a fan of aces against Taylor Fritz (in total, seven at the end of the match).
Something different is its relationship with the Masters Cup.
There, there is no way.
(...)
Enraged, Nadal began with the fuss in the middle of the second set. He was throwing his fists in the air, cursing himself.
At this point in the match, Taylor Fritz –present in his first Masters Cup due to Carlos Alcaraz's abdominal injury– was riding in a carriage.
Fritz is tall, he measures 1.96m, and from those heights he squeezes the serve like nobody else. Fritz, the best American tennis player of the moment (the only one with a place in Turin), serves at 218 km / h, and the kick from him is a torment for the receiver, who sees how bombs rain down on him from the other side of the court.
Holding on to that powerful serve, Fritz has sailed with a tailwind. He was always one step ahead of the man from Manacorí, who was unable to threaten the American's serve and on top of that he got stuck in the first tie-break, sending a ball wide that would have allowed him to stay alive.
From there, Nadal no longer found a way to return to the match. Fritz grew – his victim of him in the quarterfinals of the last Wimbledon – and Nadal sank, losing 7-6 (3) and 6-1 and on Tuesday he will have to knock down Felix Auger-Aliassime and on Thursday, Casper Ruud.
