{"id":4663,"date":"2017-09-08T11:17:30","date_gmt":"2017-09-08T15:17:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/?p=4663"},"modified":"2017-09-08T11:17:30","modified_gmt":"2017-09-08T15:17:30","slug":"del-potro-vs-nadal-preview-fairy-tale-new-york","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/2017\/09\/08\/del-potro-vs-nadal-preview-fairy-tale-new-york\/","title":{"rendered":"Del Potro vs Nadal: Will the Fairy Tale of Del Potro in New York Continue?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As Juan Martin Del Potro prepares to face Rafael Nadal, we look at his career&#8211;from young prodigy, to tragic figure, to comeback king and national hero&#8211;and consider his chances against the world #1.<\/p>\n<p>This <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordontennis.com\/us-open\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">US Open<\/a> has had its fair share of heart-warming comeback stories. Semi-finalist Sloane Stephens, who was sidelined for ten months after foot surgery; Petra Kvitova, who was stabbed in her playing hand in her home less than nine months ago; Venus Williams, who has battled back to the Top 5 despite being diagnosed with an auto immune disease in 2011.<\/p>\n<p>But while all are stories of ardour and pain, few have suffered a comeback trail as long as Juan Martin Del Potro\u2019s.<\/p>\n<p>The 2009 US Open final. 20-year-old Del Potro stuns the tennis world with a five-set victory over Roger Federer, halting the 15-time Grand Slam champion\u2019s 41-match winning streak in Flushing Meadows. The 6\u20196&#8243; Argentine did what many expected of Alexander Zverev this year&#8211;bullying his way to the title with a hammer blow forehand and a crushing first serve. In the semi-finals, he delivered Rafael Nadal one of the soundest thrashings of his career. In the land of opportunity, the world had well and truly become his oyster.<\/p>\n<p>But like a true Shakespearean tragedy, triumph was quickly followed by disaster. A wrist injury, the tennis player&#8217;s most dreaded hamartia, forced the World #4 off the tour after the Australian Open, and that May he took the poisoned chalice of surgery.<\/p>\n<p>In 2011, after plummeting to #485 in the world, Del Potro moved back to the top of the game, scooping up the accolade of ATP Comeback Player of the Year. An Olympic bronze, 10 ATP titles, and a return to the top 5 followed.<\/p>\n<p>Yet, agonisingly, that was not the end of the Argentine\u2019s woes. Wrist trouble had been lurking, Iago-like, throughout Del Potro\u2019s semi-renaissance, and he required another operation in February 2014.<\/p>\n<p>Two more operations followed, meaning the Argentine played only 14 matches in 2014 and 2015. Del Potro, once a giant of the game, had reached his nadir.<\/p>\n<p>On his injury, he spoke with the same touching ingenuousness that had won New York\u2019s heart six years prior.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cInjuries are the worst thing that can happen in the life of an athlete,\u201d he said in <a href=\"http:\/\/vorterix.com\/el_grupo_de_la_muerte\/12730\/juan_martin_del_potro\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">an interview with Vorterix Radio in February 2015<\/a>. \u201cIn the last years, I\u2019ve felt like my life had lots of ups and downs\u2014at some point, I could go back to my best ranking, and then again things changed because of an injury and all the bad things came back.\u00a0 And that\u2019s how these last years have been for me. It hasn\u2019t been easy. It\u2019s not easy to live with an injury that pulls you away from the courts for so long. It\u2019s the hardest match I\u2019ve ever played.\u00a0It tires you physically, it wears you out mentally, it fills you with fear, doubts, and uncertainty. You wake up every day thinking, \u2018Will this be the end of my career?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut today I feel very strong\u2014I won\u2019t give up because of this.\u00a0I know this is a big rock in my road, but I\u2019m really trying.\u00a0I have great desire to play again [\u2026] all this time I was out I had a really bad time\u2014I cried a lot.\u00a0It\u2019s truly ugly to watch on TV, to see that the big tournaments are opening up, and the big names winning Grand Slams are starting to change, and me feeling like I could be there and not being able to compete [\u2026] It\u2019s really hard.\u00a0But, well, I had to go through this and I have to be strong now.\u00a0After this, just by playing again, I will be happy and I\u2019m going to enjoy it a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But in 2016, Del Potro was able to make his return, and he rapidly became sport\u2019s feel good story of the year. Playing with the fearlessness of a man simply grateful to be holding a tennis racket again, he battled his way to a silver medal in Rio, defeating Nadal in the semi-finals before losing to Andy Murray in a spectacular four hour marathon. He then reached the last eight of the US Open as a wild card, before coming back from two sets down against Marin Cilic to clinch Argentina\u2019s first ever Davis Cup title.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/E6LQJzSjWfs\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>In truth, it has not been a fairy tale ten months since then. A return to the top 30, but no ATP titles, an early exit from Wimbledon and, before the US Open, only one top 10 victory to his name in 2017. But now, Del Potro has the chance to repeat his heroics of 2009 and turn tragedy into a true fairy tale.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWell, I can\u2019t believe that I\u2019m play [sic] another semi-final after all my injuries, after all my surgeries,\u201d the Argentine admitted after <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordontennis.com\/2017\/09\/06\/roger-federer-upset-juan-martin-del-potro-us-open-quarterfinals\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">defeating Roger Federer<\/a>, with that gracious humility that has earned him the title of &#8220;gentle giant.&#8221; \u201cEspecially to play here in New York, which is my favourite tournament and my favourite city in which to play tennis.\u201d No sooner had he finished than the familiar chants of &#8220;Delpo&#8221; filled the Arthur Ashe stadium. His reply to the vocal Argentinian contingent roughly translated as, \u201cThank you from the bottom of my heart.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Del Potro is a man hard not to get teary-eyed over. But let\u2019s cut the sentimentality and consider the big man\u2019s chances against World #1 and two-time US Open champion Rafael Nadal.<\/p>\n<p>While the Spaniard leads the head to head 8-5, Del Potro has the edge on hard courts with a slim 5-4 lead. Their most recent meeting came in the semi-finals of the Rio Olympics, the Argentine battling past an albeit misfiring Nadal 5-7 6-4 7-6(5). But, equally, half of Nadal\u2019s victories came when Del Potro was hardly at the height of his powers in 2011.<\/p>\n<h4><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordontennis.com\/2017\/09\/07\/5-best-nadal-vs-del-potro-matches\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jason Fernandes\u2019 review of Nadal and Del Potro\u2019s five best clashes<\/a><\/h4>\n<p>Del Potro is certainly in the mould of Nadal\u2019s famous conquerors.\u00a0Lukas Rosol, Gilles Muller, Stan Wawrinka, and more recently Denis Shapovalov and Nick Kyrgios&#8211;they have all had the power to press high up the court and take Nadal\u2019s leaping groundstrokes early. The Spaniard has looked helpless, even lightweight, in the face of such an onslaught, moving further and further behind the baseline and sinking into passivity. Del Potro undoubtedly has the physicality to implement such a strategy, and he enjoys high balls to his forehand flank. His epic against Dominic Thiem has also certainly given him chance to cut his teeth against a clay court baseliner.<\/p>\n<p>After four bouts of wrist surgery, the 28-year-old\u2019s backhand is far from the force it once was&#8211;a flat, shoveling stroke compared to the hammer blow of his forehand side. Federer\u2019s downfall was failing to consistently avoid the Del Potro forehand, his misfiring one-handed backhand too often landing centrally. As a left-hander, Nadal\u2019s bread and butter shot, his crosscourt forehand, will naturally pin Del Potro onto his backhand side. The Spaniard is also serving far better; he has made 69% of first serves over his past three matches. It will be difficult for Del Potro to get a foothold in Nadal\u2019s service games.<\/p>\n<h4><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordontennis.com\/2017\/09\/06\/federer-vs-del-potro-what-about-delpos-backhand\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Amy Lundy\u2019s look at the Argentine\u2019s backhand stroke<\/a><\/h4>\n<p>There is also the small matter of Del Potro\u2019s fitness. While there seemed to be no concerns on Wednesday, Nadal\u2019s bullying physicality will provide a far sterner examination of the Argentine\u2019s condition. &#8220;I think I am recovering well,\u201d he commented. \u201cI did what the doctor says, all the treatments, and I played just free [against Federer]. Now is still a harder match. I like to play against him [Rafael Nadal] when I&#8217;m in good conditions. But it&#8217;s not the case at this moment. For sure I will try to make winners with my forehands and don&#8217;t run too much, because my legs are tired.&#8221; In truth, the laconic Argentine always looks dead on his feet between points, trudging, sloth-like, along the baseline. But on Monday the concerns were very real, Del Potro having failed to shake off a bout of flu.<\/p>\n<p>Nadal has been as imperious in the past two rounds as he looked shaky in the first three. The World #1 totally outmuscled Alexandr Dolgopolov, before putting on a masterclass in counterpunching against Andrey Rublev. They were statement performances, and only 196 minutes of tennis. Nadal will be confident and fresh.<\/p>\n<p>But then Del Potro is one of a rare breed of players who can take the racket out of Rafael Nadal\u2019s hands. His power, as well as his unheralded defensive anticipation, is not to be underestimated.<\/p>\n<p>And what does Del Potro himself think of his chances? Well, the man who\u2019s had a career fitting of Broadway, kept it pretty dramatic.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRafa is playing a great season, he\u2019s No. 1 in the world,\u201d the Argentine said. \u201cBut with this amazing support, anything can happen.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As Juan Martin Del Potro prepares to face Rafael Nadal, we look at his career&#8211;from young prodigy, to tragic figure, to comeback king and national hero&#8211;and consider his chances against the world #1. This US Open has had its fair share of heart-warming comeback stories. Semi-finalist Sloane Stephens, who was sidelined for ten months after [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":493,"featured_media":4645,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3,8],"tags":[1717,18,84,135],"class_list":["post-4663","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-atp","category-us-open","tag-2017-us-open","tag-atp","tag-juan-martin-del-potro","tag-rafael-nadal"],"modified_by":"Yesh Ginsburg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4663","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/493"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4663"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4663\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/tennis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}