Rusedski backs ‘great champion’ Nadal to bounce back following Wimbledon ‘blip``

Former British number one tennis player Greg Rusedski has said Lukas Rosol was lucky to win the match and feels the Spaniard would bounce back soon.

London: Former British number one tennis player Greg Rusedski has said world number two Rafael Nadal’s shock defeat to world number 100 Lukas Rosol is just a blip, and feels the Spaniard would bounce back soon.

Rusedski said Rosol was lucky to win the match, as luck was on his end throughout the match. “Rafael Nadal``s exit to Lukas Rosol was the biggest shock at Wimbledon for at least a decade, and it has to rank up there as one of the biggest surprises ever. Rosol just had one of those matches when everything he hit went in; the world No100 took it to the world No2 from the first ball to the last,” Rusedski wrote in his column for a newspaper. “Nadal will be obviously be disappointed and upset, but he``s too great a champion not to bounce back. It``s just a blip. We have unrealistic expectations of the guy – he``s won 11 grand slams, been in the last five major finals and just taken a record seventh French Open, and it``s actually quite refreshing to see that he is human after all,” he added. Rusedski believes Nadal is very strong mentally, and nothing would deter him in making a strong come back. “I``m not too worried about Nadal, because mentally he``s an absolute animal. Everyone was questioning how he``d come back after losing out to Djokovic in that six-hour Australian Open final, and he went on to claim every clay-court title apart from Madrid,” Rusedski wrote. “Every time you doubt him, especially with the injury problems he``s had, he seems to bounce back stronger. He``ll get himself focused for the Olympics on the grass courts at Wimbledon, and I``m sure he``s going to want to make up for it at the Games and then the US Open,” he added. ANI