Time there was when Wimbledon was a place of joy for Rafael Nadal, with two titles in 2008 and 2010. But latterly SW19’s lawns have become an utter nightmare for him.
Lukas Rosol was ranked 100 when he beat the Spaniard in the second round in 2012; Steve Darcis was No.135 in the opening round a year later; in the last 16 just 12 months ago, Nick Kyrgios was No.144; and now Nadal’s string of defeats has reached a new low. Never before in any Grand Slam has Nadal been beaten by a qualifier – until the second round of Wimbledon 2015.
Step forward Dustin Brown, making his Centre Court debut at the age of 30. The German-Jamaican descended like some freak midsummer storm, wreaking a whirlwind of old-style serve-and-volley to devastating effect, alternated with hurricane-force returns until defeat was all that was left to the 14-time Grand Slam champion. Nadal salvaged two match points from the wreckage, but Brown – who dismissed the Spaniard in Halle last year in what was then described as the performance of his life – swept him away 7-5, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4.
In his press conference Nadal’s shock was palpable. He was as courteous as always, but his voice was barely audible and if anything he appeared at an even greater loss than in the immediate aftermath of his quarter-final defeat by Novak Djokovic at Roland Garros last month. It was as if at 29 he had realised once and for all that competitive life is finite, and that no matter what he tries from here, his old powers may never come back to him.
“I was ready to compete,” said Nadal. “I lost. Obviously this is a bad moment for me. I have to keep going and working more than ever to try to change that dynamic. I am a good loser. I always accept. I am not happy, but I accept that I am not good enough. I don’t know if I will be back to the level of 2008 or other years. If I don’t make that happen – well, I played five finals here, and took the trophy home two times, so it’s not bad.”
By contrast, Brown arrived for his own press conference clad in a Superman T-shirt, which seemed reasonable as he had just done an interview with John McEnroe in which the tennis legend had told him it was the most astonishing performance by a low-ranked player on the Centre Court that he had ever seen.
“I had never been on the Centre Court at all before,” said Brown, who played a four-hour doubles match on Wednesday. “I thought I would freak out a little. But actually it felt familiar, perhaps because of the match in Halle, even though that isn’t as big a court. I felt comfortable.
"It was easy for me to play my game against him because I had nothing to lose. I am lucky to have played him twice on my favourite surface. I wouldn’t want to play him on hard court or clay. Here it was great to play serve-and-volley so well and to do it for that long. I knew what the plan was. I wanted to take him out of his comfort zone and I held it together for the whole match.”
The tempest which engulfed Nadal began from the first stroke of the match. Brown held his opening game to love with four outright winners, and then set about scorching the Centre Court earth with his howling returns.
Nadal held steady and actually broke for 2-1, but Brown knew that he could throw the No.10 seed off his game if he stuck to his plan. Right from the off the drop shot was a key weapon, and in various forms it caught Nadal time and again.
In garb ironically reminiscent of the young Nadal – sleeveless shirt and knee-length shorts – Brown ran his opponent ragged to level for 3-3, smiling at himself in private pleasure at the thrill of it. At 5-6 Nadal served for the second time to stay in the set, only to find Brown delivering a perfect combination of creative brilliance and mental calm. The German took it with a killer return which scudded beneath Nadal’s racket – his 20th winner of the set.
Nadal is not a player given to panic. Perhaps he thought the storm had passed in the second set – Brown was still reading his serve with some blazing returns, but an early break was enough. It turned out this was merely a lull, and in no time the gale was blowing again. Nadal’s serve faltered, and successive double faults paved the way for Brown to break for 3-2. The German was feeding greedily off Nadal’s uncertainty, carving him up at the net and shrieking at himself to hang on. When he broke at the start of the fourth, in what Nadal would later describe as a “terrible” game for him, there was no way back.
