New York, Sep 6 (Agencies): Rafael Nadal has crashed to his earliest US Open exit in 10 years after Italy’s Fabio Fognini pulled off a sensational third-round victory over the two-time champion.
Eighth seed Nadal was defeated 3-6, 4-6, 6-4, 6-3, 6-4 in a 3 hour, 46 minute showdown that finished at 1.30am after squandering a two-set lead.
The stunning result confirmed the sad, sudden decline of the 14-time major winner, who until Friday had won 151 Grand Slam matches when he had taken the first two sets.
Nadal will also finish the season without at least one Grand Slam title for the first time since 2004.
It was the 15th defeat of his miserable year, which has seen him beat just two top-10 players and where his best performances at the majors were quarter-final runs at the Australian and French Opens.
Over each of the past 10 years, Nadal has won at least one grand slam.
This year, he progressed to the quarter finals of the Australian Open and French Open but was bundled out in the second round at Wimbledon.
Nadal said after the match it was not his year.
“I accept that was not my year. (I will) Keep fighting until the end of the season to finish in a positive way,” he said.
“I’m going to work on it.”
Nadal said he believed he’d improved since the beginning of the year and that he didn’t think he’d lost the match, but rather that Fognini had won it.
“I fight until the last point all the time. Not enough to win today,” he said.
“My mind allows me to fight until the end as I did all my career.”
Fognini, the 32nd seed, becomes the first Italian in the last 16 at the US Open since Davide Sanguinetti in 2005 and will face Spain’s Feliciano Lopez for a place in the quarter-finals.
“It was very tough against him,” said Fognini, who smashed 70 winners, committed 57 unforced errors and saved 11-of-19 break points in his all-or-nothing assault.
“It was an incredible match to come from two sets down against Rafa who is one of the best players in the world.”
Fognini has now defeated Nadal three times this year but his earlier wins were on clay in Rio and Barcelona.
“After the first two sets, I said ‘OK, just concentrate, keep trying and anything can happen.’ The fifth set was really difficult for both of us.” Nadal had raced into a routine two sets to love lead.
He was also a break up in both the third and fourth sets.
But the colourful, sometimes controversial 28-year-old Italian rallied with some superb shot-making as the Arthur Ashe Stadium duel ticked towards and past 1am.
By the end of the fourth set, the statistics were telling.