Wimbledon, England – By the end, the joy was gone from Rafael Nadal’s game. All those uppercuts, hops and yells of “Vamos!” he normally displays were replaced by the serious look of someone taking mental notes.
The spunk and strokes that carried Nadal to a French Open championship on clay just don’t have the same effect on grass right now, and while the 19-year-old Spaniard is convinced he can learn enough to win a title at the All England Club, that day must wait.
The No. 4-seeded Nadal lost 6-4, 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 on Thursday in the second round of Wimbledon to 69th-ranked Gilles Muller, the only man from Luxembourg to win a Grand Slam match in the Open era.
Nadal was beaten but unbowed, saying he would like to build a grass court on his home island of Mallorca so he can practice on the slick surface. Of the four majors, Nadal grew up most wanting to win Wimbledon, because only one Spanish man has, Manuel Santana in 1966.
“When I improve a lot, I can win a lot of matches here, no? Because I am fast,” said Nadal, whose English is getting better by the day. “I need to improve my volley. I need to improve my serve. I need to improve my confidence with the game on grass, no?”
Nadal shot from 51st in the rankings at the end of 2004 to the top five, but no matter how much attention he receives, the intensity might never rival what Tim Henman experiences annually at Wimbledon.
The locals haven’t had a British men’s champion to celebrate since 1936, and Henman’s serve- and-volley game carried him to the semifinals four times. Henmanmania ended early this year, though, with the sixth-seeded Englishman’s 3-6, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3, 8-6 loss to Dmitry Tursunov. It’s the first time since 1995 that Henman, 30, didn’t at least reach the fourth round.
“You sit here now and sort of feel somewhat numb,” Henman said. “But what can I do about that? Can I try harder? It’s not about that.”
So he passes the burden on to the last British player in the tournament: Andrew Murray, an 18-year-old wild card ranked 312th, who surprised No. 14 Radek Stepanek 6-4, 6-4, 6-4. Not long after, a BBC announcer suggested the grassy slope where fans picnic and watch matches on a giant screen be renamed, changing “Henman Hill” to “Murray Field.” The Scotsman’s third-round opponent is 2002 Wimbledon finalist David Nalbandian, and Murray immediately set about lowering expectations, pronouncing simply: “I’ll lose my next match.”
Looking forward in the women’s tournament, it’s tough not to focus on the potential fourth-round matchup between the Williams siblings. It looked for a time as if Serena Williams might not make it to the end of this week, but she recovered to beat qualifier Mara Santangelo of Italy 2-6, 6-3, 6-2.
Williams, whose older sister Venus beat Nicole Pratt 7-5, 6-3, said she’s playing on a slightly broken left ankle. Though it appeared to hamper her early, she was racing to turn Santangelo’s drop shots into winners by late in the second set.
“I keep promising, ‘The next match, I’m going to do A, B, C and D.’ And I didn’t do it today,” Serena said. “But I’m here to stay.”