Nadal and the fine art of surprise

One hazard of being both a fixated tennis-watcher and innately interested in numbers is that odd combinations of match scores and player statistics keep swirling about in your head. For example, in my long fandom of Rafael Nadal, there have been two key occasions - both on the eve of a Grand Slam final - when I have dwelled on the formula "12 versus 6", expecting it to become "12-7" the next day but secretly hoping it would be "13-6" instead. In both cases, the hope was pleasingly and unexpectedly realised.

The first of these was before the 2009 Australian Open final between Nadal and his great rival Roger Federer. The head-to-head between the two players was 12-6 in Rafa's favour before the match; it became 13-6 once the final was over. The second was last weekend, when Nadal and his greatest current rival, Novak Djokovic, prepared to play each other for the US Open trophy. Going into the match, Nadal had 12 Slam titles, while Djokovic had 6. Once it finished, the comparative score line was 13-6.

This coincidence of numbers sounds obscure, I know, but it can help make a couple of points. One, these were important matches against Nadal's biggest opponents. Two, it could be argued that Rafa had no business winning either of those matches. Two days before that AO final against Federer, he had played an intense, debilitating five-hour semi-final, and would later say he never thought he would recover in time for the final. Meanwhile, Federer had been stunningly imperious - even by his own standards - and had had an extra day's rest. There was no reason to think Rafa could win his very first hard-court Slam final against one of the finest hard-court players of all time.

Watching him pull that off - and then watching him, earlier this week, finding a way to meet Djokovic's flashes of brilliance with his own solidity and counter-aggression - it occurred to me that a big factor in Nadal fandom is being constantly surprised; the goal-posts for what is possible keep shifting. Back in 2006, I was surprised when he beat Federer at the French Open final because I thought it was pre-destined that Federer would complete his Career Slam (all four majors in a career) that year. Then I was surprised when Nadal won his first Slam off clay, at the historic 2008 Wimbledon final. I was surprised when he won a hard-court major, and then when he made a brilliant comeback in 2010, after a disappointing few months affected by injury. And now, in the second half of his career, at a point where he should rightly be starting his decline, I have been astonished by his comeback from injury this year: 10 titles, a 17-1 record against top 10 players, aggressive and unbeaten on hard-courts, his least favourite surface.

Nadal himself often seems taken aback by these achievements: as he said of Djokovic after the USO final, "Sometimes I really don't know how I am able to beat him." He is often accused of "sandbagging" - or publicly lowering expectations for himself - but this is an understandable attitude for a player who has struggled with a chronic knee injury over his career, and has often had to play catch-up.

When Djokovic first emerged as an A-plus player in 2008, there was some speculation along the lines that Nadal was destined to be a brief interlude between the Federer Era and the Djokovic Era, a clay-court master whose short career would be sandwiched between those of two all-time greats. This view seemed reasonable enough at the time: Nadal hadn't won a big title off clay yet, and Djokovic seemed a more complete, all-round, all-surface player. But what has actually transpired has been very different. Nadal has continued to be not merely relevant but often dominant in his individual rivalries against both Federer and Djokovic. In the process, with his very distinctive defence-to-offence style of play, he has created fresh challenges and made this entire tennis era a little more charged up and intriguing than it may otherwise have been. As a once-underconfident fan, I'm just starting to deal with the idea that there might actually be such a thing as the Rafael Nadal Era, and that we may have been living in it for the past six or seven years.