Top
Rafa Nadal 2019 US Open final
Rafa Nadal, Tennis News

Rafa Nadal: Detailed profile and career highlights


Rafa Nadal is part of an elite club of 6 male players that have won more than 900 matches. Tennishead profiles his extraordinary career

 

Rafael Nadal: 985 wins

Date of birth: 3 June 1986

Years played: Since 2002

Matches won: 985

Matches lost: 200

Win percentage: 83.1

Singles titles won: 84

Grand Slam singles titles won: 19

Weeks as world No 1: 208

Career prize money: $120,583,119

 

Of the six players with more than 900 victories in the Open era, Rafael Nadal has won a bigger percentage of his matches than anyone. How many more might the Spaniard have won if his career had not been so frequently interrupted by injury? Since his Wimbledon debut in 2003 Nadal has missed eight Grand Slam tournaments and many more at tour level.

Injury disrupted Nadal’s Grand Slam career before it had even started as an elbow problem forced him to miss the 2003 French Open. Twelve months later an ankle injury kept him out of Roland Garros and Wimbledon. When he played, however, he was a winning machine. Nadal won his first tour-level match at the age of 15 and won his first title, at Sopot in Poland, just two months past his 18th birthday. By 2005 he was sweeping through the European clay-court season, winning the tournaments in Monte-Carlo, Barcelona and Rome before claiming his first Grand Slam title on his French Open debut. He won 11 titles in total that year, which remains his best tally for a single season.

Nadal’s second most productive year came in 2013, when he won 10 titles despite missing the start of the season because of injury. In the eight tournaments he played between Sao Paulo in February and the French Open he lost only one match, to Novak Djokovic in the final in Monte-Carlo.

(All stats correct up to and including end of Australian Open 2020)


By
0

Tim Farthing, Tennishead Editorial Director & Owner, has been a huge tennis fan his whole life. He's a tennis journalist and entrepreneur as well as playing tennis to a national standard. He also helps manage his local club and volunteers for his local tennis organisation. He's a specialist in content about the administration of professional tennis and tennis coaching for all levels.