Neither in the best of dreams, nor in the most daring script of a movie, could we imagine a more epic final and, above all, more in keeping with the career of a tennis player who has already been crowned The best of all time and that, in case there was any doubt, he is the most important Spanish athlete in history. Rafa Nadal’s triumph at the Australian Open has come after more than five hours of a singular combat that will go down in the annals of tennis and sport in general. For the first time in the tournament, they came back from two sets to force the fifth and end up winning, a feat that is even more important considering that, shortly before traveling to Melbourne, Nadal came to rethink his future, because of the injuries that prevented him from performing at his best. Too affected by the coronavirus, the tennis player from Manacor arrived in Australia without being at all convinced of his performance. However, their Mental force, their capacity for suffering, the desire to win and overcome difficulties They have been superior to the drawbacks and have achieved what no other tennis player has achieved so far. Twenty-one Grand Slams contemplate a career that began in 2005 at Roland Garros, at the age of 19, and which extends, for now, until this second Australian Open, which he has won with 35. The adjectives are exhausted to define a force of nature who has grown as much by uncontested victories as by his lesson of sacrifice and honor. Thirteen titles in Paris, four in the United States, two at Wimbledon and these two in Melbourne elevate Nadal to the top of world tennis, at a time when direct confrontation with the other two stars –Federer and Djokovic– has reported unforgettable moments and a three-way rivalry like never before.
It is not that Nadal enters the Olympus of this sport, since he was already in it with all deserved, but with the victory this Sunday he stands as the maximum reference, an achievement that is much more important if one takes into account that , in this exciting three-way race, each victory has the added value of living a surely unrepeatable stage in the world of tennis. “It is one of the most exciting moments of my career,” he declared just after the exciting match, played, with the two tennis players at the limit, on the Rod Laver court. And it is for many reasons. Because he is the first to achieve the incredible figure of 21 major tournaments, because the record comes after a few critical months in his career, and because it occurs despite having all the statistics and circumstances against him.
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This Australian Open was going to be remembered as the tournament in which Djokovic was expelled from the country for refusing to respect the organization’s medical criteria, in a display of arrogance of the Serbian, but, in the end, it will be evoked as the great victory of an athlete who, beyond the tracks, is the living image of civic behavior and a mirror for new generations. It’s not just about winning, as Nadal has amply shown, but about doing it in such a way that the sport is seen as a example of overcoming. Winning is important, and it is even more important to enter history, but it is even more decisive to do it from humility, constant work and the desire to face adversity.