Nadal – Federer: twelve years of the “best game ever”

“It is the best game in history”, John McEnroe said on July 6, 2008, just 12 years ago today, after the game that just ended at the All England Club in Wimbledon Between Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. After 4 hours and 48 minutes, the Balearic conquered Wimbledon for the first time after beating the Swiss in five exciting races: 6-4, 6-4, 6-7 (5), 6-7 (8) and 9-7. They faced each other in the final for the third year in a row, after Federer had taken the titles against Nadal in 2006 and 2007 and added a total of five consecutive wound on the London grass. Both arrived at the moment at the appointment after winning, between the two, 14 of the last 16 Grand Slam disputed.

Nadal had just won a few weeks before his fourth consecutive Roland Garros, but he had the Wimbledon spine hanging. And he did it at 22, although it was not easy. Not much less. The final was to remember and had everything from the start of the meeting to the awards ceremony: in between, two interruptions by the rain and more than an hour of nerves in the locker room, a comeback from the Swiss from 0-2 and the neutralization of two match balls for the Spanish in the fourth set … even in one of those stops, with Nadal dominating the game, Toni Nadal, Rafa's coach in that final, recently confessed that he went to sleep a few minutes in the locker room.

Already with the sun retreating and the spotlights pointing at a Nadal lying on the ground, he managed the feat. At the end of that year, he said, “The best year of my career is this.” Twelve later and a long list of more conquests, it is difficult to choose one of many, but without a doubt 2008 will always be special. Now, Nadal is still at his home in Porto Cristo with his training and preparing for a US Open scheduled for the end of August that more and more voices are calling into question but which for now continues.