Rafael Nadal defeats Dominic Thiem in Brisbane in first singles match in almost a year

Playing his first singles match in almost a year, Rafael Nadal defeated Dominic Thiem in an all-Grand Slam champion match-up in Brisbane on Tuesday night, beating the 2020 US Open winner in the first round of the Australian Open lead-up event, 7-5, 6-1.

Nadal played a doubles match on Sunday, but his last singles outing came 349 days ago on January 18th, 2023—a second-round loss to Mackenzie McDonald at the Australian Open. His last singles win had come 351 days ago, over Jack Draper in Melbourne.

He was ranked No. 2 at the time, but had to end his season after the first major of the year due to a hip injury, for which he underwent surgery in June. He’s now ranked No. 672.

The 22-time Grand Slam champion made a little bit of history with his win over Thiem—it was the 1,069th tour-level win of his career, breaking a tie with Ivan Lendl for standalone fourth place on the list of most career wins for a man in the Open Era.

MOST CAREER WINS (men, Open Era):
1,274: Jimmy Connors [1,274-283]
1,251: Roger Federer [1,251-275]
1,089: Novak Djokovic [1,089-213]
1,069: Rafael Nadal [1,069-220]
1,068: Ivan Lendl [1,068-242]
951: Guillermo Vilas [951-297]
908: Ilie Nastase [908-334]
883: John McEnroe [883-198]
870: Andre Agassi [870-274]
801: Stefan Edberg [801-270]

For a while on Tuesday night there was barely anything between the two players—they traded confident holds for the first 11 games of the match. But that’s when Nadal pounced, breaking to sneak out the first set—he would break again for a 2-0 lead in the second set and then again for 5-1 before serving it out on his first try.

Among everything else, the Nadal serve was particularly on point throughout the match. He dropped just six points in 10 service games (and only three points in his first eight service games).

Nadal is now 10-6 in his head-to-head against Thiem.

Awaiting Nadal in the second round will either be the tournament’s No. 8 seed, 2021 Australian Open semifinalist and former Top 20 player Aslan Karatsev, or Australian wild card Jason Kubler.