Nadal, who climbed back to fifth in the rankings after falling to a miserable 10th earlier this year, has improved significantly since a disappointing defeat in the US Open third round.
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Not even a mid-match haircut could rescue Andy Murray against a ruthless Rafael Nadal at the O2 Arena on Wednesday afternoon.
Bizarrely, after three games of the match Murray sat down on his bench, took a pair of scissors out of his bag and cut his fringe. He held his serve to go two games up before Ferrer finally found his rhythm again, playing two pretty drop shots to win his first game of the second set.
“I’m just happy the way that I played today, happy the way I was working”, Nadal told reporters.
Murray’s mood had perhaps not been helped by the ITF’s decision in Prague on Tuesday to delay a decision on whether world No50 Aljaz Bedene should be eligble to be play for Britain in the Davis Cup until March at least.
The Scot is 10/17 with the leading online bookmakers’ site, whilst Nadal is 27/20 to beat Murray for the 16 time in his career.
“From the middle till the end of the second set he played extremely well”.
“In the second, Wawrinka was playing better. I’ll look forward to that match”.
Murray ended up landing only 43 percent of his first serves, and only 38 percent in the second set.
With eyebrow raised, he said: “It was not the right time to know that (his hair was too long)”.
After losing to Rafael Nadal in the first round, Wawrinka knew a win was vital with the same going for Ferrer after losing to Andy Murray. “He’s number two this year, he’s had an unbelievable year”, the 30-year-old added.
The world No 2, who needs one more victory to guarantee holding that position at the end of the year, has won only two of his 11 matches this year against Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Nadal. The Spaniard’s double-fault was a life line to Wawrinka who leveled at 5-5 before seeing out the set and comfortably marching on to victory.
“When I don’t think about how to hit the ball, but when I think just about where to hit the ball, that’s good news”.
He will play against Stan Wawrinka in his final round-robin match of the group on Friday. I served an extremely low percentage, maybe the lowest I’ve served all year in any match.
Kei Nishikori could join Federer in the semis if he beats the 17-time Grand Slam victor.
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But the Scot won their only previous match of 2015, beating Nadal on his home soil – and his favourite clay surface – in the Madrid final.
