Olympics: Nadal strikes precious gold and wakes up on top of the world

Today would be a good day to wake up being Rafael Nadal: French Open champion, Wimbledon champion, Olympic champion and, when the sun rose in Beijing (six hours earlier than his native Mallorca) this morning, it also shone on the new world No1, formally ending the 4½-year reign of Roger Federer.

Nadal will feel no different, he was sure. “I may be No1, but I played well last year, too. I was very happy being No2. Probably, I’ll be some time [again],” he said, as if the coat did not quite fit just yet.

In the past, you could put Nadal on any surface, as long as it was clay, and he would win, but this year all surfaces have become the same to the 22-year-old and he has won all 12 of his matches on grass, and more than 80% on hardcourts.

The problems of Federer have given him the opportunity, but Nadal has taken them. His play is more confident and aggressive on the faster courts and his ability to run down shots quite extraordinary.

No athlete is fitter, no player expends more in a match and no audience gets better value than when the Spaniard is playing. Maybe that is why crowds responded to him so warmly here this week, and maybe they liked his humility too, for there was plenty of that. “Always you can improve,” Nadal said.

In the past, the statistics for his final against Chile’s Fernando Gonzalez would have been meaningful too, for of their six previous encounters the two hardcourt matches had been won by Gonzalez. But times have moved on, and so it proved. Gonzalez is no mug, and enjoys making his presence felt, usually with a withering forehand. If it had withered all the time he might have proved a handful for Nadal, but it was far too wayward at the Olympic Green Tennis Court yesterday.

The most interesting set was the second, which Gonzalez could have won had he not fluffed a volley at set point. The three forehand errors in the tie-break that ensued, two on his own serve, effectively handed Nadal the set instead. In the third, Gonzalez had moments where his energy levels seemed to drop, which is never wise against Nadal, who broke the Chilean’s second service game and never looked back, the final score being 6-3, 7-6, 6-3.

From here Nadal moves on to the US Open, which starts next Monday, and a further examination: a fourth major title in four months would be very special indeed. Venus and Serena Williams will also be looking forward to Flushing Meadow after losing their quarter-finals in the singles here, an event won by the Russian world No7 Elena Dementieva – though the sisters went some way to making amends yesterday by claiming their third consecutive Olympic gold medal in the women’s doubles.