The 'Novak Secret' that troubles Rafa

In the first set of the final yesterday in Monte Carlo, Novak Djokovic came within inches of handing out a Bagel to Rafa in a place which could well be considered Rafa’s backyard. He couldn’t do it, though. Rafa held and broke once to avoid even a bread-stick, but at the end of the first set, the scoreline read 6-2, which is all that would have mattered as far as Djokovic was concerned.

Set 2 was, in a lot of ways, way different from how set 1 went. However, the end result was the same – Djokovic taking it away from Rafa, only this time it was in a tie-breaker, 6-2 7-6 (1). That is how Djokovic dethroned Rafa off the title defence in the Principality after 8 years, thereby ending a mind-numbing 46 match winning streak for Rafa in MonteCarlo!

Here are some of my observations on why Djokovic is such a threat for Rafa and how he alone has consistently been able to trouble Rafa, time and again, on clay. It is of significance to remind ourselves of the fact that he handed out straight set defeats to Rafa in Rome and Madrid in 2011 (Two other clay Masters where Rafa is highly dominant).

1. I am not sure if the rain interruption had anything to do with the following stat or if the ability of Djokovic to take balls on the rise is what constitutes it. The stat in question is something that was shown towards the end of set 1.

The average height at which the ball was hit by all opponents Rafa had played this week before the final: 1.28M
The average height at which the ball was hit by Djokovic in the final: 1.06M

That should have definitely played a part in taking Rafa out of his comfort zone and would have given him more reasons on how to counter the onslaught. The stat can be attributed to two things:

a) Rafa tried to hit a lot more balls deep in the court because of the fact that the Djokovic backhand is such a lethal weapon that can negate the top-spinning forehand that Nadal uses against a lot of other players;

b) Djokovic picked a lot more semi-deep balls on the rise than waiting for them to reach him. That is a ploy that worked wonders for the Russian Nikolay ‘Kolya’ Davydenko in his match-ups against Rafa. For this reason, it always surprises me why a lot of players on the tour never adopt that ploy against Rafa. Yes, taking the ball on the rise offers very little margin for errors but anyway, with any other ploy, one is most likely to lose against Rafa on clay – So, why not try that as an option? Djokovic did yesterday and got rich dividends.

2. The Djokovic backhand down-the-line (DTL) is one of the most menacing shots on tour at the moment. And in more ways than one, it came to haunt Rafa yesterday. Now to the ‘How’ of it:

A majority of players do not have a potent DTL backhand in their armoury (Does that statement remind you of the likes of del Potro, Tsonga etc?). Some of them who have it do not have the belief in the accuracy with which they can make it and end up hitting it slower than the speed at which it would be effective. Against Rafa, this won’t work because Rafa is comfortable staying in wait for a cross court backhand (which is where the ball would come most of the times) and even the rare DTL would be slow enough to assure that Rafa’s wheels can take him there from the far side of the court and give him enough time to rip one right back at the opponent.

Not so with Djokovic. His backhand DTL is a ripper of a shot. At times, it goes as fast as a forehand DTL! And this, in two ways, troubled Rafa yesterday. Rafa was unable to reach given the speed of such scorchers from Djoker’s racquet and Rafa was undecided on where to stay after sending one to Djokovic’s backhand. He was all at sea! The DTL also gives Djokovic the option of disguising his shot till the very end and occasionally change directions and send one cross court when Rafa expects the DTL version! Enough subtleties to confuse the opponent, even if the opponent is the King of Clay!

3. Djokovic is definitely in Rafa’s head like how Rafa is in Federer’s! It was pretty evident when he was able to come back from being a break down twice in the second set! In Rafa’s own words, he was playing some of his best tennis in the week in the second set and still Djokovic was able to draw him to mistakes and take him on when Rafa was serving for the set and mercilessly destroy him in a tie-breaker (Going by track record in tie-breakers, Djokovic is usually worse than Rafa).

For these reasons and the fact that Rafa and team can work them out and make adjustments to his plans in Madrid & Rome, the coming weeks building up to Roland Garros is going to be quite interesting. That Rafa is most likely to stay No.5 when the draw for RG is made also makes for an unexpected scenario of Roger, Rafa and Nole all falling in the same half of the draw! Can’t wait for the rest of the clay season. Let’s play, big fellows!