Nadal defies conventional wisdom again

eiGHT games into his early evening stroll, Rafael nadal was briefly distracted when three loud parrots circled over Centre Court and watched for a while. When the greats are in town, why not?

This old boy with the iffy feet will not go on for ever — not even he can win that rally.

but while such logic sharpens the urgency to have a look, from skies or seats, it would seem to ignore just how far he is operating outside all other conventional wisdom at the moment.

indeed, it is bordering on the absurd to note that, at the age of 36, nadal is tearing through a season that might soon be considered his most remarkable. Within it, he is also moving at ever greater speed through the lower half of the men’s draw, with his last-16 destruction of botic van de Zandschulp raising the possibility of a third Grand Slam in 2022 and the 23rd of his career.

You would still make novak djokovic the strong favourite to be the last man standing.

but after questionable performances in the opening two rounds, nadal has started to look awfully strong, first against lorenzo Sonego and then in how he booted the feathers off the 21st seed here.

barring wobbles in the third set, when he was broken twice, he was utterly dominant. True, it was never a match you expected him to lose, more so given the nerves that seemed to strangle the dutch underdog in the opening two sets.

but nadal is moving extremely well for a player with chronic foot pain and his comfort on grass is only growing now that the courts are wearing thin and slowing up.

eleventh seed Taylor Fritz is up next and will surely prove an even tougher challenge, but nadal (above) will take some stopping.

‘i continued in a positive way against a difficult opponent,’ said the Spaniard. ‘botic has been unbelievable in the last year.

‘For me to be in the quarter-finals here after not playing this tournament for three years is amazing.’

Give credit to Van de Zandschulp, he was tough to dislodge. He utilised a flair for the unexpected in the opening games, which stayed on serve, but the suspicion remained that nadal was far more comfortable at the pace. When he needed to up the level, at 5-4, he did and broke to take the set.

nadal quickly broke for 2-0 in the second, with the dutchman struggling to manage the occasion. it signified the scale of the rise of a player who was outside the world’s top 50 until January of this year.

At 5-2 down, he supported that argument by double faulting on set point.

Van de Zandschulp finally had some joy in breaking at the start of the third, but even then he gave it straight back. A second break made it 4-2, before nadal wobbled when serving for the match. That meant a tiebreak, which went nadal’s way 8-6.