رفائيل ندال يتقدم إلى الدور الربع نهائي

ELLA LING



Rafa
Nadal stepped up his bid for a fifth French Open crown with a straight
sets win over former world number one Lleyton Hewitt in Paris on
Saturday. The second seed was made to fight hard against a determined
Hewitt, but wrapped up a 6-3 6-4 6-3 victory in two hours 28 minutes on
the Philippe Chatrier court at Roland Garros.
"I am playing better now and today was a good test against Lleyton
and to win against him in three sets is very good news," Rafa said in
an interview.
"He's an unbelievable player, a great champion, he's had very good
titles and is former number one," he continued. "When I was at home I
always watched Lleyton on TV and he was one of my idols, so playing
against him now is always a pleasure".
"I had to play against the wind but I played the whole match really
well," he explained. "I was very comfortable with my forehand, my
backhand, but there was the wind. Because of the wind, Hewitt takes the
ball really early, and so the ball came to my side fairly low.
Sometimes I had trouble catching the ball because I was playing against
the wind. But those were my main difficulties. In spite of all these
difficulties, I felt fairly comfortable."
"I was a little bit worried. The weather conditions weren't very
good", Rafa said looking back at the start of the encounter. "I saw the
clouds gathering. When I walked on the court, I looked at the sky, and
I kept looking at the sky because I really wanted to wrap up this
match. I did not want to continue playing this particular match
tomorrow".
"I really wanted to have tomorrow off to take a break, and also to work", he concluded.
It is the fourth time that Rafa defeats Hewitt at French Open and
this time around, it came after the six-time Grand Slam winner only
gave up five games to him. The cool, windy weather slowed down the
court considerably and turned the match into a real challenge.
Rafa was caught cold by a fast start from Hewitt today, dropping his
serve in the opening game but he then reeled off the next four games.
Soon after, despite facing another break point, he clinched the first
set while Hewitt grew in frustration.
Nadal broke again in game three of the second set but immediately
handed his opponent parity. Both men held until game nine, when Hewitt
netted and then went long to gift Rafa a break from which the
23-year-old did not look back till the third set.
Rain began to fall at the start of a marathon fifth game, which saw
Rafa squander several break points but, as in the first set, he reeled
off another four-game winning streak to seal victory.
Rafa, who won the French Open on his first four visits to Paris, next plays Brazilian Thomaz Bellucci on Monday.
"He's a top level opponent," assessed Rafa. "I think in 2008 he went
really deep into the tournament. The last time I played him he was very
difficult. He's a clay specialist. He he has just beaten Ljubicic, so
he is quite confident. It's going to be very difficult, and it will
also be a test for me to check my level of tennis."
Vamos Rafa!