Of all the silly records that Rafael Nadal has compiled during his epic career, the silliest might be in the competition where it will all come to an end.
Since his debut in 2004, Nadal has played 30 singles matches for Spain in the Davis Cup. He has lost once, 20 years ago, to Jiri Novak of the Czech Republic. The defeat was the start of a tournament that would serve as a yearlong announcement to the world of a teenager fashioned in red dirt, who would become a 22-time Grand Slam singles champion and one of the greatest men’s players.
Two decades later, Nadal is back with Spain, this time in Malaga, for one last go-round. How much will he play? How many matches can his creaky body still take, especially on an indoor hard court? Will he play singles or doubles? Or both? In doubles, will he reunite with his heir, the 21-year-old Carlos Alcaraz, to form the “Nadalcaraz” duo of the 2024 Paris Olympics once more?
Only Nadal and David Ferrer, Spain’s captain, will be qualified to answer those questions. Everyone knows that this banged-up Nadal, who is heading toward the finish line after battling an ailing hip, a sore back, balky knees and other calamities over the past two years, is a shadow of his former self. But even if he does not strike a tennis ball, his mere presence at “that beautiful competition”, as he once described the Davis Cup, is perhaps more sneakily befitting of the end than a farewell at Roland Garros in Paris, where his legacy has stood in statue since even before he won his last title.
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Nadal won the French Open 14 times. His clay-court legacy at Roland Garros will stand, seemingly forever, at 112-4. But the Davis Cup also brought out the best in Nadal. He has played in 23 Davis Cup ties, accumulating a record of 37-5 inclusive of his 8-4 record in doubles. Spain won the Davis Cup five times during his career, more than any other country in that period, including in 2004 on the clay of Seville, where Nadal rubberstamped his authority on tennis for the first time.
Rafael Nadal doing his signature trophy bite with David Ferrer (left), Albert Costa (second left) and Fernando Verdasco (right) after winning the 2009 Davis Cup (Denis Doyle / Getty Images)
It all began with that loss to Novak in an indoor stadium in Brno in the middle of the Czech winter.
“I beat him because he was still a kid,” Novak said in an interview in October, from his hometown of Zin in the Czech Republic.
If that sounds like a player demurring in the face of a half-formed legend, Novak is plenty proud of having this small claim to fame. Given Nadal’s career, any win against him is something grandchildren need to hear about. All the same, the Czech, now 49, believes it’s a triumph that requires a bit of perspective.
The tale begins in Auckland, nearly a month before the first-round tie between the Czech Republic and Spain. Auckland, now an ATP 250 and then known as a World Series, was Novak’s favorite tournament. He had won it in 1996 and always came to New Zealand brimming with confidence. In 2004, he won three consecutive matches to set up a semifinal against a teenager from Spain he had never heard of.
Novak wandered the locker room, buttonholing fellow players for any information they had about some kid named Nadal. He quickly learned that he was a newcomer and something of a hot prospect, since he had already cracked the top 50.
Novak was 28 and ranked inside the top 15 in the world. It seemed like a manageable match. It wasn’t. Nadal took Novak apart 6-1, 6-3.
Next, they both made the third round in Australia. Nadal lost to Lleyton Hewitt; Novak to Andrei Pavel of Romania in a surprising reverse. Then came the Davis Cup, the first weekend of February. Some of Spain’s better and more experienced players were injured, so Nadal got the nod, his first for the Davis Cup team.
Once more, Novak liked his chances. Like most Spanish players, Nadal had a game built on and for red clay. He could hit hard but he was largely a defensive player still, who had not yet developed his adult strength and was entering into the pressure cooker of the Davis Cup representing his country away from home.
Novak thrived in the heat and pressure. The team format usually brought out the best in him, especially at home in front of the often rowdy Czech fans. Brno offered him a fast carpet court to zip the ball through the febrile atmosphere.
It all cohered. Novak beat the Spanish phenom in three tight sets, 7-6(2), 6-3, 7-6(3). Novak learned that Nadal was a warrior, but his backhand was then eminently attackable. He saw his opponent as a fellow solid player, early on in his tennis journey. Never in his wildest dreams did he think Nadal was headed for all-time greatness.
“Not like now,” he said.
Jiri Novak blasted and lunged his way to victory over Rafael Nadal in Brno (Joe Klamar / AFP via Getty Images)
He saw Nadal again the next day in the doubles. Novak paired with Radek Stepanek to beat Nadal and Tommy Robredo, also in straight sets.
Two days, two losses. Not exactly a storybook start to a national team career. It was the sort of weekend that could send a teenager into a bit of a tailspin.
Instead, the opposite happened. Early on Sunday afternoon, just ahead of his match, Feliciano Lopez heard Nadal calling his name as he ran after him in a stadium corridor. Jordi Arrese, Spain’s captain, had selected Lopez to play Tomas Berdych in the fourth match, with Spain down 2-1. Nadal would play the fifth and deciding match against Stepanek, if proceedings got that far.
“He goes, ‘Feli, please win this match, then I’m going to take care of the rest of this tie’,” Lopez recalled in an interview in October.
“He’s making his debut in Davis Cup after losing two matches and he was convinced that if I were to win against Berdych, he’s going to win the deciding match.”
Inspired by Nadal’s confidence, Lopez beat Berdych in four sets. Then Nadal came on and beat Stepanek in three. The Czechs weren’t sure exactly what had happened; what had happened was exactly what Nadal had planned.
Ten months later, Patrick McEnroe brought the United States Davis Cup team to Seville for the final against Spain. McEnroe recalled in an interview in October that he and the rest of the team were pretty confident, even though they were playing on the road and on clay, a surface on which Americans have tended to slip up.
Team USA included the Bryan brothers, Bob and Mike, who were on their way to becoming arguably the greatest doubles duo in tennis history. They also had Andy Roddick, then the world No. 2. Mardy Fish, that summer an Olympic silver medalist, in the second singles slot.
The Bryan brothers looked a lock to win the doubles, so if Roddick could win his singles matches, the U.S. would prevail. They spent the week before the event practicing on the slow clay of Seville’s Estadio Olimpico. It wasn’t ideal for Roddick, a classic hard-court kid from Texas, but he remained confident.
The day before the tie began, McEnroe received what he thought was some really good news. Spain had selected Nadal to play the second match on the opening night against Roddick, following Carlos Moya’s defeat of Fish in three sets.
Roddick had just drubbed Nadal at the U.S. Open, 6-0, 6-3, 6-4. Nadal was clearly a talented young player, but slotting him in against the world No. 2 in a Davis Cup final seemed like a big ask. Spain had serious options in Moya and Juan Carlos Ferrero, both French Open champions. They weren’t necessarily in their prime but were pretty close.
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What was Spain thinking?
It didn’t take long to figure that out, even if on the old grainy video Nadal’s arms coming out of his sleeveless maroon shirt are about half the size they would eventually be. His cheeks still have a touch of baby fat. He looks like a boy.
He had his teeth into the match from the beginning, pushing Roddick to a tiebreak in the first set and then winning the second convincingly, 6-2, to level.
More than 27,000 delirious fans were packed into the stadium. They had heard all about Nadal and what he might become. Less so who he already was.
They were playing outdoors, and it was getting cold. The third set stretched on and went to another tiebreak. Then something weird happened.
McEnroe said Roddick liked being coached but always wanted to be left alone on his serve. His serve was his money shot and one of the best in the game. He did not need guidance. Serving at 5-4 up in the tiebreak after Nadal missed one of those lassoed forehands down the line that would mint highlight reels for years to come, Roddick looked over at McEnroe and asked him which way to go. Roddick, who declined to be interviewed for this story, was asking for help on a shot he never needed help with.
McEnroe told him to go down the T to Nadal’s backhand. He did, but missed the tape by an inch. Then Roddick dumped his second serve into the net. He served and volleyed on second serve on the next point to get to 6-5, but he couldn’t catch up with a Nadal drop shot to put the set away. Nadal then rolled winners on the next two points and never looked back, winning the final set 6-2. When it was over, he danced in front of the crowd in celebration.
Rafael Nadal’s defeat of Andy Roddick in Seville was a pivot point in his career (Christophe Simon / AFP via Getty Images)
“He just got better as the match wore on,” McEnroe, who did not share Novak’s measured forecast of Nadal’s talents, said of that harbinger of a night.
“We all knew we were watching someone who was going to be an all-timer. We were like, ‘Wow, this kid is the real deal’.”
The Bryan brothers did their job, conceding just five games to Ferrero and Robredo in the doubles. But With Nadal waiting to play the deciding match, Moya clinched the trophy with a straight-sets win over Roddick on Sunday.
After the loss, Roddick said the atmosphere in the vast stadium was unlike anything he had ever experienced. More than 27,000 people had watched him lose to Nadal.
“You’re busy focussing on the task at hand, then you look up and there are people for as far as you can see just going nuts.”
Three years later, the Americans would get some revenge, beating Spain in a quarterfinal tie in North Carolina. This time, McEnroe knew exactly what he was going up against.
He ordered the construction of a fast hard court that would be installed in an indoor arena in Winston-Salem.
Two weeks before the tie, he tested it out himself. His ball was jumping off the court instead of sliding. The court was too slow. He ordered the manufacturer to repaint it with less sand in the paint, which creates the friction that slows down the ball. He wanted a Rafa-proof court that Roddick and his serve could thrive on.
“Lo and behold, Rafa pulled out, and we ended up beating Spain easily,” McEnroe said.
The U.S. went on to win the Davis Cup that year. The reign would be short-lived. Spain won the next two — and Nadal would never lose another singles match in the tournament.
(Top photos: Getty Images; Design: Meech Robinson)