Australian Open 2022: Rafael Nadal become 1st man to clinch 21 Grand Slam titles
Rafael Nadal won his record 21st Grand Slam championship after defeating Daniil Medvedev in a great tennis match. That's the most Grand Slam titles won by any men's singles player of all time. Prior to the tournament, Nadal was matched for the most men's singles matches with Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic.
It was the 2nd longest Australian Open championship, following Novak Djokovic's five-set victory over Rafael Nadal in 2012, which lasted 5 hours and 52 minutes. Nadal became only the fourth player in history to achieve all four big championships at least 2 times with his 2-6, 6-7 (5), 6-4, 6-4, 7-5 victory, which began sunday night and was interrupted for a bit in the second set when a spectator rushed onto the field.
A classic Nadal, riding a wave of loud support from the fans, produced one of his greatest performances to reject Medvedev once more, less than three years after quitting the Russian devastated in 5 sets in the 2019 U.S. Open finals. Nadal came back from two sets back to prevent a fifth set in the Australian Open finals, then defeated US Open winner Daniil Medvedev. After Medvedev grabbed a 6-2, 7-6 (5) lead, Nadal won the third and fourth sets 6-4, 6-4. Nadal broke for a 5-3 lead in the fourth and then had a breakpoint, but Medvedev survived and hold to force the 21-time major champion to serve it out yet again.