Rafael Nadal has chance to overtake Roger Federer again at US Open despite Cincinnati loss

If the 36-year-old won the title in Ohio and Daniill Medvedev were to lose his match to Denis Shapovalov tonight, he would have returned to the summit of men’s tennis for the first time since February 2020. But Borna Coric had other ideas as he produced an exceptional display to defeat the tennis legend 7-6(9), 4-6, 6-3.

Nadal will stay ranked number three for the time being but the number one spot will be up for grabs once again at the final Grand Slam in New York later this month. Federer is currently the oldest No 1 in the ATP Tour history having held the ranking at 36 years and 10 months old. It’s been 928 days since Nadal last held the top spot and by adding that on to current gap and it becomes a little over 14 years. Therefore, he’s just shy if he becomes No 1 now of overtaking Federer for biggest gap between first and last time he was No 1.

Furthermore, with the 22-time Grand Slam champion only recently turning 36, he would need to hold the No 1 spot past April next year to take the record away from Federer as the oldest No 1 in history. Nadal already became the first person to surpass the Swiss maestro’s Grand Slam tally of 20 after winning the Australian Open earlier this year.

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source: express.co.uk