Rafa Nadal crushes giant Sam Querrey to reach 9th Wimbledon semi final

Rafa Nadal continued his impressive Wimbledon form as he overcame grass court specialist Sam Querrey in a relatively comfortable win.

Playing for the sixth time, Rafa Nadal recorded his fifth win over 31 year old Querrey. He started proceedings at a high intensity, and broke the American serve at the second time of asking, taking a 2-1 lead in the first set.

Bidding for his first Wimbledon title since 2010, Nadal had problems closing out the first set. At 5-3 up the man from Mallorca lost three set points on the Querrey serve, before losing another on his own serve and getting broken by the Californian to level the set at 5-5. The experienced 33 year old Spaniard broke back ahead again the next game, setting up a second chance to serve for the set.

Sam Querrey made the semi final at Wimbledon in 2017 and put pressure on the world number two’s serve again. This time round however Nadal saved three break points, before Querrey blasted a forehand wide to hand the first set to the third seed.

The twelve time French Open champion Rafa Nadal was able to secure an early break of serve again in the second set. Saving two Querrey break points, Nadal broke serve again late on, and served the set out 6-2.

Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray are two big upsets that Querrey has been able to pull off at SW19, but today it did not look like he was going to match these with a win over Nadal. Unseeded at Wimbledon for the first time since 2015, Querrey dropped serve straight away in the third set after a graceful cross court winner from the Nadal racket. A successive break of serve just four games later saw the third seed with a double break of serve.

Nadal served the third set out 6-2. He will face Roger Federer in the semi final on Friday. The pair have never met in a Wimbledon match that wasn’t the final. Federer got the better of Nadal to lift the 2006 and 2007 crowns, but when they met for a third successive year Nadal won his maiden Wimbledon title in 2008. Meeting 40th time in their careers, Nadal holds a 24-15 record.

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