Rafael Nadal completes the second part of "La Decima" with a strong win over Dominic Thiem in Barcelona final - UBITENNIS

Rafael Nadal completes the second part of “La Decima” with a strong win over Dominic Thiem in Barcelona final

By Alex Burton
2 Min Read
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Nadal took his tenth title in Barcelona and must be considered a strong favourite for the French Open (Zimbio.com)

Rafael Nadal left few in doubt about who will be favourite for the French Open title when the year’s second Grand Slam gets under way in a month’s time. The Spaniard completed a 6-4, 6-1 win over Austrian Dominic Thiem to win his tenth Barcelona crown.

Thiem may have felt in positive spirits ahead of the match. The Austrian has a good record on clay, reaching last year’s Roland Garros semi-finals and also has a career win against Nadal on clay. The World No.9 picked up his first win over No.1 Murray in the semi-finals, and had also won the ATP 500 event in Rio de Janeiro without dropping a set.

Yet Nadal proved a different proposition altogether compared to last year where they split two meetings on clay. Nadal proved in excellent form, saving just a single point in a competitive first set, before breaking late on.

World No.1 Andy Murray had used the drop-shot and volley tactics to try and unsettle Thiem ultimately unsuccessfully in their semi-finals. Nadal unsurprisingly used more traditional clay tactics, manoeuvring Thiem around the court with a vicious array of ground strokes that offered the seemingly unconquerable level of top spin.

Thiem had worked hard to stay with Nadal in the first set, and fought gamely to hold his first service game in the second. That was as good as things got for the Austrian though, as Nadal raced through the final five games finishing the match in a relatively short one hour and thirty-one minutes.

Neither Nadal nor Thiem feature in any of the three 250 events next week taking place in Estoril, Munich, and Istanbul, as the back-to-back Masters 1000 events of Madrid and Rome are not far away.

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