Nadal too good for Shapovalov on clay

Rafael Nadal is still too good for Denis Shapovalov on in the dirt.

The King of Clay was eager to avenge his loss against the Canadian (Montreal 2017) to face Denis on a more “familiar” surface in the 3rd round in Rome.

The match

Even if Rafa’s artillery is much better than Shapovalov’s on clay, the 19-year-old managed to stay with the Mallorcan for the first part of the opening set. That was a big struggle for Denis that had to battle in most of his service games (while Rafa dropped just 5 points in the entire match on his serve).

Eventually, the Canadian dropped his serve in the 7th game after fierce rallies and then he wasn’t able to stop the bleeding. From a 2-3 scoreline, Nadal won 10 of the following 12 games to win the contest 6-4 6-1. The match ended after just 82 minutes.

How Nadal defeated Shapovalov

It was Rafa to explain how he defeated Denis to comment

“It was a solid match for me. I started with some mistakes on the return. But with my serve, I didn’t lose many points. At the beginning, I really think that he was serving big.

I got the break in the 3-all. And then the match changed… He probably stopped to serve that big a little bit, and I was a little bit more relaxed.”

Next vs. Fognini

Rafa will have a tough test in the quarters as he will face Fabio Fognini. Even if Rafa has a 10-3 record against the Italian, Fabio has often caused problems to the Mallorcan also on clay. In addition, Fabio will have a very strong support from the home crowd. This is going to be an interesting match to watch.