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With his once mighty game and confidence flagging, the formerly invincible Rafael Nadal is enduring through the worst slump of his career, dropping out of the ATP top five this year. Nadal, the fourteen-time major champion, has always prided himself on refining his game and finding new ideas and tactics to constantly evolve and improve. But today, Nadal seems to have stagnated into a mediocre version of himself. One of the beauties of tennis, is that change can happen in an instant – advice, inspiration and counsel can generate from absolutely any source – for example, the American of the 70’s Jeff Borowiak once said he was losing a match at Wimbledon – until an astute ballkid had the gumption to suggest he should go to net more. Borowiak heeded the helpful advice from the youngster and eventually he won the match. So for this feature, I asked several prominent champions if they could offer the 29-year-old Nadal any advice or suggestions about how to regain his missing mojo —

Peter Fleming: “He’s just lost his confidence, that’s all. He just needs to go out and have fun again and just let it go. And hopefully things will come back to him.”

Manuel Santana: “Rafa is a champion all the way. As a champion, he’s going to make better what’s happened to him. He’s such a good player. I see many people around here saying he’s finished, finished, finished. He’s not finished. He’s going to win at least one more time Paris. The players don’t understand that Rafa is not finished. He’s only 29. The master (Roger Federer) is 34 [smiles]. My advice to Rafa to break this slump? Right now his second serve is a little weak. He certainly knows that he has to make more first serves. He’s a champion. And he’s going to be a champion for many more years.”

Rennae Stubbs: “It’s hard to tell someone that great what to do. I do think he knows what he has to do. When you don’t have that confidence and you’re losing matches and the balls are getting short on the court and obviously, the forehand… you just gotta keep working hard. You have to just try and win that one match that can change things around for you. And maybe that one match is here. He stated that he’s feeling really good and he’s almost back to his best. If that’s the case, then it’s hard to tell somebody as great as him what to do. I think he knows what he has to do. For me, he has to just win one of those really big matches against one of those big players again. And his confidence will be bac like that.”

Guy Forget: “It’s hard to give advice to someone who’s won so many matches. He’s been one of the best ambassadors we’ve ever had in our sport. So I trust him 100 percent to find the right solution. I think he’s had some physical issues in the last year, year and a half, that probably changed his way of practicing and of training. He had to do a little less. I think by doing that, he maybe lost a bit of speed, which is normal. And if any of the top guys – whether it’s Roger or Rafa or Novak – that are good in defense – lose a little bit of their speed, then you can lose a bit of your confidence. And it’s all linked together. As soon as you start to be physically fit again, you can train more, you can be faster, then you play better and have more confidence. It builds up. I think as soon as Rafa will be physically fit again, he’ll get up to where he was. I don’t think there’s any need for him to change the way he plays. Of course, he can serve a little bigger. But Rafa has been unbelievable the past six, seven years to always improve his game, to always find new things from the way things worked earlier. He’s such a true champion that I wouldn’t dare giving him advice [smiles].”

Corrado Barrazzuti: “A big champion like that, it’s very difficult for me to help Nadal. For me, it’s very difficult to give advice to Nadal. Because he’s a big champion, he’s won all that there is to win in the world. What I can say… I really don’t know [laughs]. I don’t think that he needs much advice. Nadal is a big champion. And he’s gonna make a lot of victories still in the career I think.”

Feliciano Lopez: “Advice from me to him? I think it should be the opposite [smiles]. Well, all those players, they go through tough moments. I remember Roger, two or three years ago, he wasn’t playing his best. He was able to come back stronger. I think now with Rafa, I thin he’s going to do the same. It’s not easy to be top of the hill every year. So he’s not playing his best. But he’s going to be okay. He’s not at the end of his career.”

Mark Woodforde: “It’s tough to break away from something that’s held up for years and years since he was a youngster. Being primarily a defensive player, his movement has always been supreme. I think he’s with a bit of a confidence lapse, his movement being compromised, so he doesn’t recover out of the corners as well. In the past, he’s been able to adapt to playing on hard courts in New York and grass on Wimbledon by flattening out his ground play and getting closer to the baseline. And a willingness to move forward. I think it’s easier said than done, but for longevity in his career, I think that’s maybe something he needs to look into – is just trying to shorten up some of the points, otherwise, if he continues on hovering so deep behind the court playing these elongated points, it’s tough to see him playing for another five years.”

Tom Gullickson: “Obviously, a guy with his credentials, I’m sure there’s no panic or there certainly shouldn’t be any panic. I think kind of just getting back to fundamentals a little bit and if I were him I’d kinda review tapes of when I was playing my best tennis – on all surfaces, not just clay – when he won Wimbledon, when he won US Open. I would virtually take out those tapes and study what I was doing then and compare it to what’s happening now. And just think of continuing to get better all the time. I think his game has leveled off, stagnated a little bit, while the other guys up at the top are getting better. And it’s kind of interesting to watch Federer kind of re-create himself under Edberg’s influence and obviously going to the 97 instead of the 90 and I think he’s serving better, the backhand is better. He rediscovered the joy of winning points at the net, which I think, for me, as a coach with a formerly aggressive player, I love the fact that Federer is kind of setting the trend of You can win at the net. I think these guys, Djokovic, are finishing more points at the net.”

“I think when Nadal played his best tennis on hard court and on grass, his court positioning was very good and he was playing more inside the court. When he loses confidence, his natural instinct, he tends to fall back behind the baseline sometimes, and wait for the ball to settle, wait for it to reach its peak, rather than taking the ball on the rise. When he’s inside the court playing aggressive with his forehand and then finishing points at the net – all those things go together. Better court positioning makes taking the ball early at the top of the bounce a lot easier. And because of that your transition game is going to get better, because you’re a lot closer to the net. You don’t have far to go to get in good position to make a volley. And close the point with a volley. These would be my suggestions.”

Henri Leconte: “I think he has to start working on his game to play maybe shorter points, because he wants to… I don’t think he can play the same way he did a long time ago, you know, from the baseline and stay back and make winners. I think he should try to change a little bit his game like Roger did, to shorten points, to play better, go for the shots. That’s what he has to do.”

Scoop’s latest book Facing Nadal is available at amazon for $9.99

etc offer tips · Leconte · Lopez · Santana · Stubbs · Woodforde

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