The King of Clay vs the Champion of Grass
It's that time of the year again!
All eyes in the Tennis world are towards Melbourne as first of the four grand slams, the Australian Open, is going to begin soon.
Fans haven't yet got over last year's stunning finale where Federer defeated Nadal in an epic five-setter.
This year's Australian Open, however, has so far been dominated by injury doubts and player withdrawals. Big names like Andy Murray, Serena Williams, Victoria Azarenka won't be participating in Melbourne owing to their health concerns.
Withdrawals of contenders could pave the way for Roger Federer to win his second straight major in Melbourne. He also got a kind early draw being handed the bottom quarter. Rafael Nadal was not so lucky as he might have to face No. 16 seed John Isner in the fourth round.
Speaking of these two phenomenal players, we all know that Roger Federer is the champion of grass court while Rafael Nadal is the undisputed king of clay.
Interestingly, Nadal remained unbeaten on clay for an unbelievable 72 matches while Federer hasn't lost a single match in the last 48 encounters on his favourite grass court.
Well, how about we keep a match between these two allowing Roger to play on grass court & Rafael on clay?
Then, we could close the never-ending Federer vs Nadal debate once and for all, couldn't we?
Gearing up for the battle!
Well, believe it or not, this "clay-grass thriller" has happened on a unique court made just for this match with clay court on one side & grass on the other.
It cost $1.63 million & took 19 days to prepare this court.
Place: Rafael's home island, Palma De Mallorca.
Date: 2 May, 2007
World #1 standing against World #2.
One, who hadn't lost a single match on the grass for five years, the other one who was undefeated on the clay since the last three years.
Both competed against each other for the 11th time with the Spaniard having won seven of those ten meetings against the Swiss.
Who do you think was going to win the match?