Nadal, playing in his 99th final, conceded Djokovic was on a different level on the night as his two-year trophy-less streak on hard courts continued.
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Djokovic booked his place in the final by defeating third seed Tomas Berdych in straights.
FILE-Serbia’s Novak Djokovic (R) greets Spain’s Rafael Nadal after winning the men’s singles semi-final match on day seven of the ATP World Tour Finals tennis tournament in London on November 21, 2015. I know nobody playing tennis like this ever.
Djokovic served for 5-1 with a serve-and-double-volley victor, and Nadal’s hold simply put off the inevitable, a 6-2 victory for Djokovic of extraordinary and relentless accuracy in 73 minutes, 30 winners to only 13 unforced errors.
The Serb was forced to save break point after Nadal had produced a series of sumptuous forehands that were unsettling the Serb, but Djokovic, whose exertions in Qatar this week have been characterised by laborious starts, held firm to to take the first game.
The Serb has now won nine of his last 10 clashes with Nadal.
Nadal revealed: “Well, for me the match is easy to analyse”.
At the ATP World Tour final of the Qatar Open in Doha, Qatar, Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal will renew their historic rivalry, as they will meet for the 47th time here.
Nadal fought hard to make the match competitive but was unable to control his service games, while Djokovic’s ability to change the direction of the ball from the baseline repeatedly caught the world No. 5 off-guard. It has to be an encouraging sign for Nadal that he hasn’t suffered a loss against a player who is of a lesser caliber than he.
Back in the days when Nadal was still sporting a muscle top and pirate trousers, Djokovic was simply an upcoming challenger to the Spaniard and the Queen’s Club was decked in Stella Artois red, these two played out a high-quality final in west London. Again the momentum swung and this time Djokovic would not let it go.
It was Djokovic’s 12th title win since he lost the quarter-final here a year ago.
“This is exactly how I want to start the year, getting to the final in the first tournament of the year, against one of my biggest rivals”, Djokovic said. Not only will Saturday’s match break the tie but it could reveal much about what lies ahead for the rest of the year, and certainly in the Australian Open, which gets underway in just over a week.
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Djokovic dominated 2015, winning three of the year’s four grand slams, and already looks in the groove in the build-up to this month’s Australian Open. “You can learn so many things from him”.
