Friday May 14th 2021
First false start, then top duel
Nadal takes cold revenge on Zverev
The clay court king strikes back: A week after his impressive victory in Madrid, Alexander Zverev conceded a defeat against Rafael Nadal in the Masters quarter-finals in Rome, despite a strong performance. The German’s fate was a completely lost start to the match.
Alexander Zverev missed the semi-finals at the tennis tournament in Rome. The German number one lost in the Masters 1000 event in the quarter-finals against the Spaniard Rafael Nadal 3: 6, 4: 6 despite a good performance and thus missed another surprise against the clay court king. Last week, Zverev had won against Nadal in Madrid on the way to the title and thus celebrated his third win in a row against the 34-year-old Mallorcan.
In Rome, Zverev was quickly 4-0 down, but then improved and offered Nadal another duel at eye level. However, Zverev could not use his break chances this time. Especially in the second set, the man from Hamburg had several opportunities to find his way back into the encounter. Especially with the score of 4: 5. It was precisely in these moments that Nadal played his best tennis and in the end deservedly won. After two hours, Nadal converted his first match point.
By the way, Zverev also missed being the second player to beat Nadal twice within a week. So far, this has only been achieved by world number one Novak Djokovic in 2011. In 2017 Zverev celebrated his first title of the prestigious Masters series in Rome, the following year he only failed there in the final against Nadal.
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