Nadal, Hewitt Survive Thrillers
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© Getty ImagesLleyton Hewitt
Top seed Rafael Nadal and three-time champion Lleyton Hewitt both had to survive final-set tie-breaks before setting up a mouthwatering quarterfinal at the Stella Artois Championships.
Nadal, making his debut at The Queen’s Club, needed a minute over three hours before finally overcoming fellow Spaniard Fernando Verdasco 2-6, 7-6(3), 7-6(3), while Hewitt hit back against Max Mirnyi to win 4-6, 6-1, 7-6(4).
For Nadal, making the transition to grass having won 60 consecutive matches on clay over the course of the last two years, the win marked his 26th in a row since his loss to Carlos Moya in Miami in March.
The 20-year-old from Mallorca, who has made no secret of his ambition to succeed on grass, twice went up a break in the third set against Verdasco, only to be pulled back by his fellow left-hander. Verdasco saved a match point a 4-5 and 5-6 but could not do anything about Nadal’s dominance in the tie-break, as he took it 7-3 to book a place in the quarterfinals.
Nadal has now won 29 of his last 31 matches against his countrymen since 2004, and 17 of his last 19 against left-handed opposition.
Hewitt, a winner here from 2000-02, is looking to join John McEnroe and Boris Becker as the only four-time winners of the Stella Artois Championship, was relieved to have got through against Mirnyi considering their last five matches had gone the distance.
“It's always a tough match against Max. Every time I played him, we've had battles. You don't get that many opportunities against a guy like him so if you get that second serve on breakpoint or that slight opening, you really have to take it. That said, I still was up a break twice in the final set and wasn't able to convert that break. He played well, though, in those games. But it's nice to come through a tight match against a good grass court player.”
Looking ahead to playing Nadal, against whom he won their first three meetings before losing to the Spaniard in the fourth round at the French Open last week, Hewitt said their meeting on clay should have little bearing on the outcome. “If we play on grass, it's probably totally different, especially to two weeks ago,” said the Australian. “It's probably more so closer to the hard court meetings I think that we've had in the past.”