Big victory for Milos Raonic as he takes out Rafael Nadal at Indian Wells; next up is Roger Federer
INDIAN WELLS, Calif. – So much of tennis is hanging in there, competing, and waiting for the opportunities you nearly always are rewarded with if you do.
Milos Raonic has had those opportunities before against the very best on the ATP Tour. This time, he capitalized. The 24-year-old Canadian’s 4-6, 7-6 (10), 7-5 victory over Rafael Nadal in the quarter-finals of the BNP Paris Open Friday came after saving three match points.
It was a three-hour battle with the most physical player on Tour in rather extreme heat that only abated a bit in the third set, when the shadows took over the court and the temperature dropped at least a little. It was so hot, Raonic’s increasingly-legendary hairdo, prepared with the usual care and the usual amount of hair product, looked suspiciously droopy at times.
But Raonic’s energy never drooped. Nor did his desire. It was his first victory in six tries against Nadal; he had just one set to show for his previous five attempts. In this one, in the second-set tiebreaker, he was a shot away from losing in straight sets three different times.
Somehow, he found a way.
“I think it's just constant improvement. I think I have a better understanding dealing with experiences of playing Roger (Federer), Rafa, and Novak (Djokovic) many times over the last 12 months specifically. Because I have been always sort of pushing to the later stages of the bigger tournaments, and normally it's them that I'm playing at those moments,” Raonic said. “It has just given me a sense of, ‘Okay, what do I want to do different this time than the last few times?’ It worked out today,” he said.
Nadal is still on the comeback trail after seven months’ absence in 2014. Much of his tennis this season, with the exception of the Australian Open, came on the clay courts in South America. So while he wasn’t happy to lose, he said there was “90 per cent” positive to take out of it even if he won more points, was more effective on serve, had more break-point opportunities – and three match points – and lost.
“Frustrating? No. I enjoyed the match. I enjoyed on court. I enjoyed suffering his serve. I enjoyed trying to be very focused with my serve all the time. I think I did well. I enjoying the fact that I felt well with myself on court again,” Nadal said. “So I felt competitive. I felt strong, with the right energy. Feeling that I was there fighting for the victory against a top player again on a good surface for him is a big (improvement) for me.
“As I said before the tournament, I am much closer than one month and a half (ago to) what I want to be,” he added. “I had a lot of chances to win today.”
Raonic’s demeanour was superb throughout. There was little of that occasional negative energy that can come out when he’s making as many errors as he did in the first two sets. There was n barking at his team of supporters; there was just calm. Hit a 142-mph serve to save a break point? No reaction. Ask for the towel.
The three match points in that second-set tiebreak? He can only really remember one of them.
“To be honest with you, at the moments when I was playing those match points it didn't really feel like match points. It was just like another point that I was trying to get through,” he said. “I can only remember one that he sort of gifted me a second-serve return with his forehand, but I don't even remember the last two. It just sort of going through the paces at that moment of what do I need to do now.”
Now: Federer, who defeated No. 9 seed Tomas Berdych 6-4, 6-0 in a match where the veteran Czech displayed none of the belief or staying power that the younger Raonic did against Nadal.
Even with the short turnaround (the match will probably start around 1:30 or 2 p.m., less than 24 hours after Raonic wrapped it up against Nadal), the dynamic is a little different.
For one thing, Raonic has beaten Federer before, in Paris last fall on an indoor hard court. And he very nearly did it again in Brisbane, Australia to start his 2015 campaign, falling 6-4 in the third set. Raonic has already faced Federer nine times and, of all the top players, he has generally been at his most competitive against the Swiss legend.
Raonic said that last meeting in Brisbane was a very positive stepping stone, despite the defeat. And perhaps it was a match that helped him Friday against Nadal, where he also lost the first set.
“It was the first time I really, being a set and a break down, gave myself sort of a second breath of chance in a match. So that was a big thing to take away from it,” he said. “It was also important in the sense that for most of the part it was my mobility, my movement, and my ground-stroking that kept me alive in that match and gave me opportunities at the beginning of the third set.
“I don't think I served that great that match, so I think it gives me something that I had I wanted to do differently this time around,” he said.
