Nadal stuns Murray in Tour Finals

Roger Federer got one over on world No. 1 Novak Djokovic as the Swiss great booked his World Tour Finals last four spot with a straight sets victory late Tuesday.

Whether Nadal goes through to the semifinals depends on the result of Wednesday’s second match in the four-man group when world No. 4 Stan Wawrinka of Switzerland takes on Spain’s seventh seed David Ferrer.

Claiming his first and only victory of the year against one of his three closest rivals, No. 5 Rafael Nadal swept No. 2 Andy Murray in straight sets 6-4 6-1 at the ATP World Tour Finals Wednesday at the O2 Arena in London.

Nadal’s physical woes over the past several years (wrist, knees, back and appendix, to name a few) have left him lacking in confidence and, therefore, made him more tentative on the court. I feel enjoying on court. I’m competing with everybody else equally for this trophy as any other trophy.

“I started the match extremely well, I think. Also I didn’t help myself out there”, he explained.

For Nadal, his play so far at the tournament has been a continuation of his late season improvement during a year in which he has lost 19 times, a relatively staggering number for him.

“I’m just happy the way that I played today, happy the way I was working”, Nadal told reporters.

The 28-year-old’s vision had looked clear enough at the start of the match, breaking serve in the opening game, only to drop his own serve immediately as Nadal worked the angles.

“The couple of matches, first couple of matches he played here against [Stan] Wawrinka and Murray showed that, showed that he feels more confident, shows that he’s starting to miss less, serve efficiently, use his forehand much better”.

“I’m not saying that losing is ever the most positive thing”, said Murray.

Murray clung on in the face of five break points but played a poor service game at 4-5 to fall 0-40 down, and Nadal closed out the set with a volley. Murray won the last match-up between the two rivals, which was during the finals of the 2015 Madrid Open, 6-3 6-2, earlier this year.

Wawrinka’s normally imperious backhand was failing him but a moment of complacency from Ferrer allowed the French Open champion back into the match.

Ferrer then got to 5-3 up in the deciding but he sent down an untimely double fault to leave the set back on serve. It was like the low 40s and in the second set like 35 percent.

“I tried to do my best”.