Can Nadal Beat Djokovic in 2012?    

            After winning the 2010 U.S. Open, Rafael Nadal had captured every Grand Slam tournament in tennis, and his world number one ranking points wise was way ahead of any other player. It was all good for him entering the 2011 season until his terrible losing streak against Novak Djokovic last season. The Serbian crushed Rafa six times in a row on finals. Nadal lost some of his length of shot since Djokovic knows how to move around the court and how to take the ball earlier. The aggression from Djokvic caused Nadal to play shorter  most points during the year, rather than dictating.

            Nadal doesn’t like being stuck in a backhand cross-court rally, he wants to be dictating play with his forehand. Djokovic, with his heavy topspin forehand, can take Rafa off the court and force heavy pressure to his backhand. In the six matches last year, Djokovic received many short balls and put them away with ease.

            Besides just the groundstrokes, Nadal struggled holding his own serve against Djokovic. He was content with spinning his second serve in with nothing on it, and after the first meeting, Djokovic realized how to take advantage of it in order to take the lead in the point.

            In order to regain his winning ways and confidence against the Djoker, Nadal will have to improve in a few areas in his game for 2012; His serve, backhand, ball movement, mental game, and match preparation.

            Nadal’s serve has really improved the last few years, but he can definitely get stronger at it. In 2011, he won 71% percent of his first serve points, but against Djokovic that number was way down. After the Australian Open, he will have more time to improve on his serve and increase the whip on his serve. His backhand will need to improve or at least keep this shot deeper because Djokovic will keep running him off the court. I’m sure Nadal has been watching a lot of film of last year’s matches and noticing at times he is off balanced with this shot. Rafa needs to keep the ball much deeper and has to play with a better margin for error. Also, he has to have belief that he can take down Djokovic because he looked dejected at the end of many of their matches last year.

            Rafa needs to find his way back to victory against Novak Djokovic early in the 2012 season. He certainly has the game to take Djokovic, but it all depends on if he truly believes he can take him down after going 0-6 in finals against him last year. Maybe in two Sundays from now Nadal and Djokovic will be playing in the 2012 Australian Open Final.