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Rafael Nadal Confident for the Mutua Madrid Open: Will He Keep Winning Titles?
Published: May 8, 2012
It wasn’t just that Nadal had finally beaten his No. 1 nemesis for the first time in eight tries. It was a restoration of his swaggering play.
There was Nadal on his clay-court kingdom, swatting topspin with his maniacal frenzy and cannonading selected shots against his besieged opponent. He scampered with that extra energy that’s often a split-second difference between defense and offense.
Most of all, he played with the controlled fury that made him the best player in the history of clay-court tennis.
Nadal’s transformation is curious. His skill set has not improved, but he played differently. He took more chances, varied his patterns and bolstered his serve.
Will Nadal continue to build on this newfound momentum? How did he recapture his fiery spirit and bludgeoning execution?
The Natural
Rafael Nadal is strikingly similar to the mythic baseball hero Roy Hobbs, a character from Bernard Malamud’s novel, The Natural (played by Robert Redford in its movie adaptation).
Both were phenomenal 18-year-old left-handers who beat the reigning superstar of their time, and announced their potential in their own defiant ways. "...someday, I’m going to break every record in the book," Hobbs told acquaintances.
Nadal and Hobbs then found their careers at a standstill, unable to complete their marches through the record books.
Hobbs suffered physical tragedy that kept him from baseball for several years. When he finally put his life and career back together and became the most sensational ballplayer the game had ever seen, he explained to his former girlfriend the real reason his career took so long to recover:
“I lost my confidence. Then there was just no going b...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Tennis
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