Nadal’s in mood to speed up
TIC, tic, tic, tic, boom. In between the fidgeting, shuffling, ruffling and picking his shorts out of his backside, Rafael Nadal really can play some delightfully brutal tennis.
But yesterday, as so often, the same question kept coming to mind, recurring each time he embarked on that monstrously long routine of adjustments and bounces between shots.
Sure, he made quick work of Dudi Sela, crushing his first-round opponent 6-3, 6-3, 6-2. Not many strokes wasted there. But it is necessary at this juncture to consider that a day earlier Roger Federer conceded the same amount of games against Dusan Lajovic and it took 79 minutes – 31 fewer than Nadal spent pummelling the world No 127.
It’s not a massive issue, of course, but it is most definitely a relevant one, with Wimbledon considering using an on-court shot clock for the 2019 edition, which would do a far stronger job than any umpire has managed in enforcing the 25-second rule between points.
Nadal is the most notorious abuser of that law and it is tempting to wonder if his pre-shot tics will make way for something a little more speedy when a whopping great clock is counting him down.
Predictably, the Spaniard hates the idea. He has made that clear in the past and the 32-year-old reiterated it in a delightfully scathing manner again when asked about it after his demolition job yesterday.
‘If you want to see a quick game without thinking, well done,’ he said. And then he just kept on going.
‘If you want to keep playing in a sport where you need to think, you need to play with more tactics, you want to have long and good rallies, then of course you are going the wrong way.
‘But it seems like sometimes it is only about the business, so I can’t support this, no, because I don’t feel the matches that stay for the history of our sport went that quick (snapping fingers).’
He wasn’t done there. ‘I don’t remember emotional matches where the total time has been two hours,’ he added. ‘All the matches that have been important in the history of our sport have been four hours, five hours.
‘To play these kind of matches you need time between points because you cannot play points in a row with long rallies, with emotional points, having only 25 seconds between points.’
Point made, and not a right-to-left, left-to-right stroke of his forehead in sight, not a tug of the shirt and shorts to be seen. He stayed well within his comfort zone yesterday and only entered the higher gears when necessary, such as at 3-3 in the first set.
Sela had been competitive until that stage but Nadal reeled off 16 straight points to take the set and gain a break for 1-0 at the start of the second.
His only wobble came with a dropped service game at the start of the third. The response? An immediate break back and then two more. Next up is Mikhail Kukushkin and quite likely another demolition, in between the fidgeting, of course.
Elsewhere, seventh seed Dominic Thiem of Austria retired injured while trailing 6-4, 7-5, 2-0 to Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus.
SEED IN DANGER
THE No 7 seed Karolina Pliskova looked less than convincing against Britain’s Harriet Dart in the first round and will have to improve if she is to get by Victoria Azarenka in the first match on Centre Court. Pliskova has a wonderful serve but has curiously failed to deliver at Wimbledon. The Czech has never been beyond the second round and that record could well continue against Azarenka who has won two Australian Open titles and reached the finals of another two Grand Slams.
GROUND PASS BONUS
THE last match of the day on the picturesque Court 18 is a chance to see two rising stars of the men’s game. The Grecian Stefanos Tsitsipas is a wonderful shotmaker with a superb one-handed backhand. At 19 he already finds himself as the No 31 seed here and he is reckoned to be a future Grand Slam champion. He faces 21-year-old Jared Donaldson, one of a pack of youngsters out to return the USA to the summit of men’s tennis.