Madrid Masters Final: Djokovic Beats Nadal 7-5 6-4!

It's starting to get scary. Who can stop World #2 Novak Djokovic from winning matches? Not even World #1 Rafael Nadal, the greatest clay court player of all time, could win a set against Djokovic on his home turf of Madrid today, losing 7-5 6-4 in the Mutua Madrilena Open, a.k.a Madrid Masters. Djokovic began the match be brushing away double breakpoint by winning 4 consecutive points and rushing to a 4-0 lead in the set. Even though Nadal was able to crawl his way to 5-all, he was always being forced to hold serve to stay in the set and he succumbed at 5-6 to lose the first set on Djokovic's 3rd set point. In the second set, Nadal came alive by breaking Djokovic's first service game but the Serb immediately broke back.

It was Djokovic's 32nd consecutive match win of 2011, his 6th consecutive ATP tour title of the year, and 3rd consecutive Masters final (Indian Wells, Miami and now Madrid) win over Nadal this year. He ended Nadal's 37-match winning streak on clay, much to my surprise.

Djokovic improved to 10 wins and 16 losses against Nadal overall, and 1 win and 9 losses on clay. Most ominously, after losing the first 5 finals the two competed, the Serbian has won the next three.

Will Novak Djokovic be #1 by the end of the year?

Federer-Nadal XXIV: Madrid Masters Semifinal

For the 24th time in their careers, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal will meet on the ATP tour, tomorrow in the semifinals of the Madrid Open. Nadal leads their head-to-head series 15-8 and 10-2 on clay. Federer beat Robin Soderling while Nadal got a walkover when Juan Martin del Potro withdrew with a hip injury.
The last time they played, at the 2011 Miami Masters, Nadal won easily in straight sets.

Novak Djokovic maintained his 2011 unbeaten streak by surviving a 3-set struggle on the red dirt with David Ferrer. He has now won 30 matches this year, surpassing Ivan Lendl's 29-0 record from 1986. He still has far to before he can match John McEnroe's 1984 streak of 42 wins in a row. Djokovic will face Brazil's Thomaz Bellucci in his first Masters-level semifinal.