Australian Open: Alex de Minaur no match for Rafael Nadal in third round match

Brendan Bradford

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Australian Open: Alex de Minaur no match for Rafael Nadal in third round match image

Rafael Nadal was too good for Alex de Minaur in their third round clash at the Australian Open , but the young Aussie won over many more fans despite the loss on Friday night. 

Nadal won through to the fourth round with a 6-1 6-2 6-4 win, but that scoreline doesn't do justice to the way de Minaur played - especially early on.

Out of the gates, the 19-year-old showed exactly why he's one of the most exciting prospects coming through. 

The pair remained on serve during the first three games, with de Minaur fending off numerous break-points as Nadal held serve twice. 

Those first three games took an incredible 23-minutes. To put that into perspective, Roger Federer took just 20 minutes to take the first set off American Taylor Fritz earlier in the day. 

MORE: Federer's huge praise for de Minaur | Kyrgios turns commentator | Tomic calls Hewitt a liar  

Despite enjoying some vocal home crowd support, de Minaur was unable to go with Nadal for the rest of the set, with commentator John McEnroe saying the Australian's legs looked a bit heavy. 

The seven-time grand slam champion had a point - it's been a busy three weeks for de Minaur. 

After beating countrymen Alexei Popyrin and Jordan Thompson on the way to reaching the quarter-finals of the Brisbane International, de Minaur travelled south for the Sydney International. 

He had a phenomenal week in front of his home fans, winning his maiden ATP title by playing his semi-final against Gilles Simon and his final opposite Andreas Seppi on the same day.

A quick turnaround saw him beat Pedro Sousa and Henri Laaksonen in the first two rounds of the Australian Open, before coming up against an imperious Nadal in the round of 32. 

If the first three games of the match took a while, the first game of the second set was an absolute marathon. With de Minaur serving, the game took well over 10 minutes as the Aussie held off four break points before eventually being broken. 

While de Minaur was being made to work to hold serve, Nadal had a relatively easy time of it, taking just a couple of minutes to get through most of his games. 

Down 5-2 in the set, de Minaur had three break point opportunities, but Nadal was too powerful and too clinical, defending them and taking the second set. 

"It's gotta be a horrific, terrible, that feeling," McEnroe said. 

The sentiment was shared across the tennis world. 


It was the same story throughout the third set. De Minaur did his best and scrapped his way to every point, but Nadal was just fitter, bigger and fresher. 

As Nadal marched on towards another spot in the last 16, the energy slowly seeped out of the sold out Rod Laver Arena, but de Minaur never gave up. 

Down 4-2, he managed to earn a crucial point with a forehand winner after a marathon rally. A fired-up de Minaur held serve and showed the kind of fighting spirit Australian tennis fans have been searching for in their big stars. 

The final mark of how much respect de Minaur already has from the Australian public was the ovation he received when preparing to serve to stay in the match in the third. 

It was faith he repaid by winning the game to love, before Nadal served for the win. In a phenomenal last game, de Minaur managed to save five match points before Nadal finally got the win. 

Despite the defeat, de Minaur went a long way to earning even more fans the world over, with everyone loving his fighting spirit. 


 

 



 


 


 


 


 



 


 

Brendan Bradford