Herioc Nadal confirms return to tennis

First topic message reminder :

Golden Career Grand Slam Holder 11-time Winner Rafael Nadal has confirmed he will enter the Chile Open, which starts on 4th February.
http://www.atpworldtour.com/News/Tennis/2013/01/Features/Nadal-To-Play-At-Vina-del-Mar.aspx

Earlier he accepted a wildcard to return at the Brazil Open, which starts on 11th February but has not also confirmed he is playing Chile too, which starts a week earlier.
http://www.atpworldtour.com/News/Tennis/2013/01/Features/Nadal-Set-For-Sao-Paulo-Next-Month.aspx

This comes as a surprise considering Nadal was meant to return for the Mexican Open later in February, but he has been feeling good in training and hence pre-poned his return.

Rafael Nadal, founder of the charity 'Rafael Nadal Foundation', helps to provide an opportunity for children and adolescents with disabilities, those coming from underprivileged surroundings and those limited by an unfortunate family environment, who run the risk of being excluded from society. His three projects include: Vicente Ferrer Foundation in Antapur, India; the Special Olympics; and the Aldeas Infantiles SOS. His work in India was noted worldwide, as the Rafael Nadal foundation set up tennis schools which also provided education; for children of all ages and backgrounds.



Amritia3ee

Henman Bill wrote:Rafa's drop shots have been FAR better than his opponent's!

I take that back. Things changed later.

Anyway 6-3 6-2 to Nadal.

6-3 6-2 (Delbonis was 2-0 up...then won 3 more games) after 7-8 months away against a relative form clay horse (won challenger last week) shows how damned hard this guy is to dislodge on this surface. Must be a nightmare facing Nadal on dirt.

Henman Bill wrote:No, and I never saw it in the media or anything. Just find the W/L records online (the source was posted on another thread recently), add 2 wins to Nadal's, and recalculate. Come back to me and see if you get the same result.

It sounds reasonable. He's on .827 with Borg (if I remember correctly), so he could go up to .828

JuliusHMarx wrote:

Henman Bill wrote:No, and I never saw it in the media or anything. Just find the W/L records online (the source was posted on another thread recently), add 2 wins to Nadal's, and recalculate. Come back to me and see if you get the same result.

It sounds reasonable. He's on .827 with Borg (if I remember correctly), so he could go up to .828

Good.
Apparently I've not been writing much Nadal-worshipping articles recently and this seems to provide a perfect platform.
HB even gifted me a fantastic template on the 'era' thread which I can use.

Can Rafa win 40 clay matches in a season? Wonder what the record is?

Vina del Mar 4 28 man tournament
Sao Paolo 4 28
Acapulco, Mexico 5 32
Monte Carlo 5 56
Barcelona 5 48
Madrid 5 56
Rome 5 56
Paris 7 128

Rafa is currently on a winning streak this season of :1
Total clay winning streak of : 13

I suppose he might skip Madrid though, it will be interesting to see anyway, could be getting ahead of myself.

Henman Bill wrote:Can Rafa win 40 clay matches in a season? Wonder what the record is?

Vina del Mar 4 28 man tournament
Sao Paolo 4 28
Acapulco, Mexico 5 32
Monte Carlo 5 56
Barcelona 5 48
Madrid 5 56
Rome 5 56
Paris 7 128

Rafa is currently on a winning streak this season of :1
Total clay winning streak of : 13

I suppose he might skip Madrid though, it will be interesting to see anyway, could be getting ahead of myself.

He's just coming back from injury.

How is Nadal Heroically charitable? does this mean Nadal throws matches? are you accusing Nadal of throwing matches? explain the title bit more clearly IMBL , I certainly didn't expect this from a die hard Nadal fan.

invisiblecoolers wrote:How is Nadal Historically charitable? does this mean Nadal throws matches? are you accusing Nadal of throwing matches? explain the title bit more clearly IMBL

Bogbrush suggested it, ask him

Anyway good to have you back IC

It Must Be Love wrote:

invisiblecoolers wrote:How is Nadal Historically charitable? does this mean Nadal throws matches? are you accusing Nadal of throwing matches? explain the title bit more clearly IMBL

Bogbrush suggested it, ask him

It should be welfare charity hero returns.

The charity is that he gave Delbonis 5 games...

Good to have Rafa back.

I think Nadal is going to be pretty good when he does make it back as I have always said he is clearly an exceptional talent who has proven time and again he can recover from injuries. Lets hope one of the three rolls royces of this golden period recovers to his full talents.

lydian wrote:The charity is that he gave Delbonis 5 games...

The charity he did was actually in Wimbledon 2012 against Rosol by gifting 3 sets

It Must Be Love wrote:Anyway good to have you back IC

Thx IMBL , got bored of all those week era threads in the Tennis off season , just came to check whether anything interesting is posted.

socal1976 wrote:Lets hope one of the three rolls royces of this golden period recovers to his full talents.

I did not realise talent also requires recovery. . Surprised to see three. I am sure CC will be at your throat in the morning.

Welcome back Rafa good to see you

laverfan wrote:

socal1976 wrote:Lets hope one of the three rolls royces of this golden period recovers to his full talents.

I did not realise talent also requires recovery. . Surprised to see three. I am sure CC will be at your throat in the morning.

It's great that 606v2 has strong fans of individual players. In sport it's always nice to see a little passion. But sometimes I wonder if it is passion or just posters being deliberately pig headed and maybe even "WUMing" a little when they try to build up their favorite player to the heights of two of the all time greats. When they also get all emotional and huffy when anyone responds with the obvious (ie some of the incredible stats and standards that Federer and Nadal posses that puts them in this lofty position) it's difficult to have any sort of rational discussion without posters being "at other posters throats"... or at the very least being tempted to tease (I confess I'm sometimes a little guilty of being tempted to tease...)

Back on topic. Watched the "Heroically Charitable Nadal" in a shaky feed last night. What a fun match for the 2nd round of a small 250 tournament in Chile! Nadal certainly will have given the spectators their moneys worth. Roger may be beautiful to watch but Rafa is exciting. Something in his play but also something about how nervous he can appear whilst at the same time never holding anything back. He has experienced winning on the biggest stages but still looked pretty excited to win yesterday. Fingers crossed for his knees.

I think his biggest fear was not being able to put on "good show" his nerves were very obvious I thought.. but once he overcame that he was fine.

Rafa is charitable because he occassionally lets Federer win on a hard court and regularly lets Djokovic win on a hard court. I'd like to see more of this kind of charity in the European clay court season.

I'm pleased Rafa is playing again and I don't even like his style of play. He brings something else to the top of the game and I, for one, hope he gets back to his best before too long.
It's a bit swings and roundabouts for him at the moment. He will soon have a mass of points to defend as he eases himself back in. But then, on the other hand,when he's fitter he can go into the second half of the season knowing that there is nothing to defend for eight months.
It would certainly give a season a different look if Rafa was only average during the clay court season but finished strongly at the end of the year.
As for predictions, I reckon he will be in good enough shape by RG to be favourite to take the French title again. The top guys may want him to do well by then as the better he does the better their chance of avoiding him at RG.

I'm not hugely keen on his style of play either. Purely because there's not much variety involved... But despite this I like watching him. What Rafa brings is huge presence, a warrior mentality and an x-factor to the sport.

I hope Agassi is wrong when he says Rafa will take a year to get back to his previous level because I think the top of the game has missed him. A Rafa at 70% still has a shot at the French open and I hope he gets enough rhythm and fitness back to reach the latter stages.

sirfredperry wrote:I'm pleased Rafa is playing again and I don't even like his style of play. He brings something else to the top of the game and I, for one, hope he gets back to his best before too long.
It's a bit swings and roundabouts for him at the moment. He will soon have a mass of points to defend as he eases himself back in. But then, on the other hand,when he's fitter he can go into the second half of the season knowing that there is nothing to defend for eight months.
It would certainly give a season a different look if Rafa was only average during the clay court season but finished strongly at the end of the year.
As for predictions, I reckon he will be in good enough shape by RG to be favourite to take the French title again. The top guys may want him to do well by then as the better he does the better their chance of avoiding him at RG.

Yep

Danny82 - Echo your sentiments. I said a couple of years ago that even if Rafa lost a leg he'd probably be favourite for the French and that if he lost both legs he might only make the semis.
Rog and Andy can at least console themselves that a fit Rafa might prevent Djoko cleaning up at RG (and possibly going on to a GS this year?) or, even better for them, knock Nole out early depending on how the draw goes.
With Rog likely to be less successful this year, Andy M could benefit from Rafa carving up some of Nole's points. Few have mentioned it yet, but a good clay court season could help Murray to number one.

Henman Bill wrote:Rafa is charitable because he occassionally lets Federer win on a hard court and regularly lets Djokovic win on a hard court. I'd like to see more of this kind of charity in the European clay court season.

Hope he does his charity works to Murray as well in the upcoming years, I know he did a lot of times but Murray couldn't capitalize on most attempts as he was charitable too:D

Any time violations yet or is he getting nice friendly treatment on his return?

No time violations.
Against Delbonis he didn't take that much time between serves as far as I could tell.

hawkeye wrote:

laverfan wrote:

socal1976 wrote:Lets hope one of the three rolls royces of this golden period recovers to his full talents.

I did not realise talent also requires recovery. . Surprised to see three. I am sure CC will be at your throat in the morning.

It's great that 606v2 has strong fans of individual players. In sport it's always nice to see a little passion. But sometimes I wonder if it is passion or just posters being deliberately pig headed and maybe even "WUMing" a little when they try to build up their favorite player to the heights of two of the all time greats. When they also get all emotional and huffy when anyone responds with the obvious (ie some of the incredible stats and standards that Federer and Nadal posses that puts them in this lofty position) it's difficult to have any sort of rational discussion without posters being "at other posters throats"... or at the very least being tempted to tease (I confess I'm sometimes a little guilty of being tempted to tease...)

Back on topic. Watched the "Heroically Charitable Nadal" in a shaky feed last night. What a fun match for the 2nd round of a small 250 tournament in Chile! Nadal certainly will have given the spectators their moneys worth. Roger may be beautiful to watch but Rafa is exciting. Something in his play but also something about how nervous he can appear whilst at the same time never holding anything back. He has experienced winning on the biggest stages but still looked pretty excited to win yesterday. Fingers crossed for his knees.

Oh come Hawkeye I set you up perfectly and you refuse to join in the fun. what is wumming about discussing the finer points of the rolls royces of this era in comparison to the yugos of the early 2000s, but I digress there is another thread for that discussion. On the subject of the heroic Nadal I think he will be better faster than what the general consensus is as long as he is healthy.

^

Ha ha! socal. You must have noticed that sometimes I can't help but join in with the fun. Agree on your final point. If Nadal is healthy he will be fine. Has a healthy Nadal ever been beaten?

hawkeye wrote:^

Ha ha! socal. You must have noticed that sometimes I can't help but join in with the fun. Agree on your final point. If Nadal is healthy he will be fine. Has a healthy Nadal ever been beaten?

Yes, plenty of times.

It Must Be Love

Ha ha! I am at a loss for words.

I even have a list of those occasions.

It Must Be Love wrote:I even have a list of those occasions.

That goes without saying

HE, please stop.

Oh! Luvsports. Don't you want me to write an article inviting nominations for any matches that Rafa may have lost when not injured? I thought it might have been fun...

"Hawkeye" and "fun", don't go hand in hand.

OHHH SNNNAAPPPPP!

socal1976 wrote: what is wumming about discussing the finer points of the rolls royces of this era in comparison to the yugos of the early 2000s, but I digress there is another thread for that discussion.

Two such threads can be easily merged, just let us know when you want the mods to push the button. .

It is 'Groundhog Day' with Bill Murray... or is it 'Ghostbusters'...

No I don't want this thread to me merged with any other thread.

Site rule - "Post in English. If you wish to post in a language other than English, a translation to English is required"

It Must Be Love wrote:No I don't want this thread to me merged with any other thread.

NP. IMBL.

JuliusHMarx wrote:Site rule - "Post in English. If you wish to post in a language other than English, a translation to English is required"

Yeah... because the translation is really really hard isn't it...

something about a camping trip in the film hercules confirming that he will attend a regatta in chile?

LuvSports! wrote:something about a camping trip in the film hercules confirming that he will attend a regatta in chile?

Nearly there.
Think Nadal...

It Must Be Love wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Site rule - "Post in English. If you wish to post in a language other than English, a translation to English is required"

Yeah... because the translation is really really hard isn't it...

So you're refusing to follow the site rules as stated by the Admins, which you agreed to follow when you joined?

JuliusHMarx wrote:

It Must Be Love wrote:

JuliusHMarx wrote:Site rule - "Post in English. If you wish to post in a language other than English, a translation to English is required"

Yeah... because the translation is really really hard isn't it...

So you're refusing to follow the site rules as stated by the Admins, which you agreed to follow when you joined?

Yes I am. That's correct.

It matters not if it is in Spanish or English it is still a ridiculous title

something about nadal on a camping trip in the film hercules confirming that he will attend a regatta in chile?

aced that one! BOOOOMMM

LuvSports! wrote:something about nadal on a camping trip in the film hercules confirming that he will attend a regatta in chile?

aced that one! BOOOOMMM

Yes, that's correct.

Oh dear. Please change the title back to English in accordance with site rules.

JuliusHMarx wrote:Oh dear. Please change the title back to English in accordance with site rules.

Wow... hardline moderating.
I thought 'legendario' and 'herioco' is pretty obvious to see what they mean, but if you want to be pednatic then ok.