2005 Rafael Nadal tennis season

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2005 Rafael Nadal tennis season

Name	Rafael Nadal Parera
Country	Spain
Calendar prize money	$ 3,874,751
Singles
Calendar titles	11
Year-end ranking	No. 2
Ranking change from previous year	49
Grand Slam results
Australian Open	4R
French Open	W
Wimbledon	2R
US Open	3R

The 2005 Rafael Nadal tennis season started in January. Nadal won eleven singles titles and one doubles title with Albert Costa in 2005.

Australian Open

At the 2005 Australian Open, Nadal lost in the fourth round to eventual runner-up Lleyton Hewitt.

Hard court

Nadal reached the final of the 2005 Miami Masters, and despite being two points from a straight-sets victory, he was defeated in five sets by world No. 1 Roger Federer.

Clay court

Nadal then dominated the spring clay court season. He won 24 consecutive singles matches, which broke Andre Agassi's Open Era record of consecutive match wins for a male teenager.^[1] Nadal won the Torneo Conde de Godó in Barcelona and beat 2004 French Open runner-up Guillermo Coria in the finals of the 2005 Monte Carlo Masters and the 2005 Rome Masters. These victories raised his ranking to world No. 5^[2] and made him one of the favorites at his career-first French Open. On his 19th birthday, Nadal defeated Federer in the 2005 French Open semifinals, being one of only four players who defeated the top-seeded player that year (along with Marat Safin, Richard Gasquet, and David Nalbandian). Two days later, he defeated Mariano Puerta in the final, becoming the second male player after Mats Wilander to win the French Open on his first attempt. He also became the first teenager to win a Grand Slam singles title since Pete Sampras won the 1990 US Open at age 19. Winning the French Open improved Nadal's ranking to world No. 3.^[2]

Grass court

Three days after his victory in Paris, Nadal's 24-match winning streak was snapped in the first round of the grass court Gerry Weber Open in Halle, Germany, where he lost to the German Alexander Waske.^[3] He then lost in the second round of 2005 Wimbledon to Gilles Müller of Luxembourg.

Summer hard court

Immediately after Wimbledon, Nadal won 16 consecutive matches and three consecutive tournaments, bringing his ranking to world No. 2 on 25 July 2005. Nadal started his North American summer hard-court season by defeating Agassi in the final of the 2005 Canada Masters, but lost in the first round of the 2005 Cincinnati Masters. Nadal was seeded second at the 2005 US Open, where he was upset in the third round by world No. 49 James Blake in four sets.

In September, he defeated Coria in the final of the China Open in Beijing and won both of his Davis Cup matches against Italy. In October, he won his fourth ATP Masters Series title of the year, defeating Ivan Ljubičić in the final of the 2005 Madrid Masters. He then suffered a foot injury that prevented him from competing in the year-ending Tennis Masters Cup.^[4]

Both Nadal and Federer won eleven singles titles and four ATP Masters Series titles in 2005. Nadal broke Mats Wilander's previous teenage record of nine in 1983.^[5] Nine of Nadal's titles were on clay, and the remainder were on hard courts. Nadal won 79 matches, second only to Federer's 81. Nadal won the Golden Bagel Award for 2005, with eleven 6–0 sets during the year.^[6]

Year end ranking

Nadal finished the year as the world No. 2 this is the highest year-end ranking ever by a Spanish male player and he won the ATP Most Improved Player of the Year award.

Best year

This was also Nadal's best year to record, collecting 11 titles.

References