Nadal laments dip in form

London: Former World No.1 Rafael Nadal lamented his dismal form, especially against top-10 players in the second half of the season after going down tamely 1-6, 6-7 to Russia’s Nikolay Davydenko in the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals at the O2 Arena here late on Wednesday.

“I didn’t arrive at this tournament with full confidence that one needs to win these matches. And in the moments that I had to play well, I didn’t play well, I had mistakes,” Nadal shrugged after falling to Davydenko in Wednesday’s late night match.

Going into his second round robin match this time against the World No.6 from Russia, Nadal was one win away from a magical career record of 400 wins. But that too eluded the former World No.1 from Spain as Davydenko hustled him into submission to keep his hopes alive for a semifinal berth from Group B here on Saturday.

“On Saturday, I am going to be ready to practice hard another time on clay. I am going to try my best to be as good as possible on Friday,” Nadal promised.

Both Nadal and Davydenko were in a precarious situation following first round losses to Robin Soderling and Novak Djokovic respectively on Monday. And with one last group match remaining, it is near goodbye for the World No.2 from Spain even if he does win against Djokovic on Friday.

Nadal has been unable to arrest his slide in form. He is 1-7 against top-10 players since his loss to Federer in the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 at the Madrid final on May 17. His lone top-10 win since then has come against No.9 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the quarterfinals of the BNP Paribas Masters earlier this month.

Davydenko was in a mighty hurry as he ran through the first set in 27 minutes aided with two breaks to win it 6-1. But in the second it looked as though the Spaniard might put up a fight after being tied 2-2. But Davydenko broke away at 3-2 and then held for 4-2.

However, Nadal managed to claw back with his first break to draw level 4-4. But his miseries continued as he hit a forehand into the net in the 11th game as Davydenko broke once again to lead 6-5. However, the Russian failed to navigate Nadal’s return as the Spaniard shot back to tie 6-6 to force a tie-break that Davydenko puffed on to win 7-4.

“I was mentally better today. I tried to do different things during the match like trying to play aggressive with the forehand. So that’s important as I improved a bit today. And that’s the idea: to keep on improving little by little each day,” Nadal stated.

Despite taking an early bow from this tournament, the native of Mallorca has not lost all hope, and thankfully for him – barring next week’s Davis Cup final in Barcelona - this is the last event for this season. “I am ready to practice hard and I have the motivation to play my best tennis one more time. So I am ready to start practicing and start playing in 2010,” Nadal vouched.