Statistical battle: Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer

The ATP recently released stats showing Rafael Nadal’s impressive record against the best in the world

If there was ever any doubt as to the abilities of the incredible competitor that is Rafael Nadal, here’s something which will quell any lingering questions. The ATP World Tour recently carried an article which showcased Nadal’s head-to-head record against all of the players in the current Top 30 of the ATP Rankings (as on 19 August, 2013).

The stats are pretty phenomenal to say the least. The Spaniard has a winning record against every single one of those Top 30 players. World No.1 Novak Djokovic and Swiss maestro Roger Federer are the only two players, in fact, to have registered more than five wins against Nadal.

Nadal has a 21-15 record versus Djokovic, which translates to a 58% win percentage (his lowest), while against Federer, his record stands at 21-10 with a 68% win percentage. The only other player who looks to have given him some amount of trouble is Russian Mikhail Youzhny, who has managed to win 4 of his 14 encounters with Nadal.

The complete record of Nadal’s performances against the Top 30 (as on 19 August 2013) as released by the ATP can be seen below.

Rafael Nadal’s record against the Top 30 players in the ATP rankings as on 19 August 2013

The record exemplifies how good Nadal has been against the top players in the world.

But, how do the other two fare on a similar plane?

We did a little bit of data mining ourselves to come up with that and see how the likes of Federer and Djokovic fare on a similar scale.

Here are the records of Federer and Djokovic against that same Top 30.

Novak Djokovic’s record against the Top 30 players in the ATP rankings as on 19 August 2013

Looking at Djokovic’s record, it is pretty identical. Though not quite as dominant as Rafa, the World No.1 has a losing record against only Nadal and Federer. This, of course, has to do with the Serb becoming a dominant force a few years later than Nadal.

He has a pretty impressive record against the other members of the Top 10, with his record against Murray now at 11-8 after some of the Scot’s recent victories in the last two years.

Youzhny seems to be quite a challenge to the top players as he again has one of the better losing records against the Serbian, managing to win 3 of their 8 encounters. Djokovic’s struggles against big-serving American John Isner are also well documented and the record shows just that – of the five matches played between them, Djokovic has only won three.

Djokovic, also, has not played against a few of the players in question, thereby lowering his overall win percentages. Against Kei Nishikori, the Djoker has a 50% record, splitting the two matches that they’ve played.

Roger Federer’s record against the Top 30 players in the ATP rankings as on 19 August 2013

Roger Federer’s case is quite an interesting one. The 17-time Grand Slam champion has a losing record against two of the top-3 players – Nadal and Murray. He does hold a narrow advantage over Djokovic (16-13) with a 55% win record.

That’s where the differences with Nadal end; Federer is absolutely dominant against every other player barring Grigor Dimitrov and Kevin Anderson, whom he has never played in his career.

In fact, in terms of dominance, Federer’s record surpasses that of Nadal’s. Rafa has a 100% winning record against 14 of the 30 players in consideration; Roger boasts the same against 15 of them.

Federer and Nadal are the only ones of the ‘Big Four’ to even have a 100% win record against a top 10 player – Stanislas Wawrinka in Nadal’s case (10-0) while David Ferrer is the poor victim in the case of Federer, having not won a single game in 14 attempts.

We could look at Murray’s stats on the same benchmark as well, but it is still a little too early as he does have only two Grand Slam titles to his name and his winning run did begin only towards the end of last year.

(From L to R) Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer at the recent ATP Heritage Celebration in New York ahead of the US Open

So, where does that leave us in terms of trying to stack these three great champions in Federer, Nadal and Djokovic?

Barring the win percentages, it is pretty clear that all three boast numbers that are quite remarkable. Nadal’s graph shows us how ruthless he has been on tour, especially against the major players. Yes, he has had his share of early exits to lower-ranked opposition at the Slams, but they have been few and far between. It also goes to show that the farther he progresses at an event, the harder it is to beat him, exemplified by his record against the top players. It also pits him as perhaps one of the greatest competitors ever in the game, a player who doggedly refuses to give up on matches, no matter the circumstances.

For Djokovic, he is well on his way to attaining similar numbers. His win percentages will improve with more wins that he will accumulate against these players. It also goes to show that barring Federer and Nadal, the Serb hasn’t really had trouble with anyone else. He also has been less susceptible to go out in the early stages of a tournament. He has six Grand Slams to his name.

Federer’s numbers illustrate what a wonderful career the man from Switzerland has had. Barring his head-to-head’s against Nadal and an improving Murray, which represent an almighty aberration, Federer has been utterly dominant against the others. When he went out in the second round at Wimbledon to Sergiy Stakhovsky, it was the first time since his maiden Slam victory at Wimbledon ’03 that he had lost before the quarter-finals stage. His record against players ranked 5 to 30 is testament to that. It also shows his competitiveness across time; at 32, into perhaps his final few chapters, Federer boasts a winning record against the veterans as well as some of the new kids on the block.

It would be ill-advised for us to enter into another of those “Who is the greatest of them all?” debates on the back of these stats. Instead, what these numbers try and provide us is an understanding of the exemplary careers of these great men, each of them in various stages of the life cycle at the moment.

Perhaps next time, we could get similar stats from the ATP regarding their performances across the different surfaces. Now, that might be another number-crunching adventure, well worth taking up.