Rafael Nadal records 74th win against top-10 opponent on hardcourt, joins elite list of players with more than 50% win rate against top-10 opponents on all 3 surfaces

Rafael Nadal produced a remarkable display of shotmaking on Friday to defeat Daniil Medvedev 6-3, 6-3 in the semifinals of the 2022 Mexican Open. The win over the World No. 2 was the Spaniard's 74th victory against a top-10 opponent on hardcourt.

Prior to the match, Nadal had a 73-73 win-loss record against opponents in that bracket. His win against the Russian improved his record to 74-73, amounting to a win rate of 50.3%. Impressively, the Mallorcan has beaten top-10 opponents more than half the time on all three surfaces - grass, hard and clay.

On clay, the 21-time Grand Slam champion has the highest-ever win percentage against top-10 opponents, with an incredible 81.67% success rate (98 wins in 120 matches). He is followed by Bjorn Borg (72.13%) and Ivan Lendl (66.67%).

On grass, which is regarded by many as his least favorite surface, the Mallorcan has a 69.23% winning percentage against players ranked inside the top 10, with nine wins out of 13 matches. On the all-time list of players with the best winning ratio, the Spaniard is fourth after Rod Laver (84.62%), Pete Sampras (78.57%) and Borg (76.47%).

Only four other men in the Open Era have at least a 50% win rate against top-10 opponents on all three surfaces. They are: Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, Daniil Medvedev and Boris Becker.

Here are their winning percentages on each surface:

Player	Win % on Grass	Win % on Clay	Win % on Hard
Roger Federer	65.6% (21 wins in 32)	52.4% (32 wins in 61)	67.3% (161 wins in 239)
Novak Djokovic	63.6% (14 wins in 22)	58.4% (45 wins in 77)	73.1% (169 wins in 231)
Boris Becker	63.3% (19 wins in 30)	50.0% (10 wins in 20)	54.0% (20 wins in 37)
Daniil Medevedev	50% (1 win in 2)	60.0% (3 wins in 5)	53.0% (26 wins in 49)

If only players with more than 50% success rate are considered, Becker and Medvedev have to be dropped from the conversation. Becker had a 10-10 win/loss record on clay, while Medvedev has a 50% win rate on grass.

Rafael Nadal has the 4th highest win percentage against top-10 players

Rafael Nadal has the fourth best winning percentage against top-10 opponents in ATP history

Rafael Nadal has faced top-10 players 280 times in his career, including the semifinal match against Daniil Medvedev at the 2022 Mexican Open. He has ended up as the victor on 181 occasions for an overall winning percentage of 64.64%.

Previously, the Spaniard had a win percentage of 64.51%, which was the fifth highest on the ATP tour, marginally behind Roger Federer. The Swiss has won 224 out of 347 such matches for a win percentage of 64.55%.

But Nadal's win over Medvedev has taken him above Federer on the list.

The three players who are ahead of the Spaniard are Bjorn Borg, Novak Djokovic and Boris Becker. Borg leads the pack with a win percentage of 71.3% (117 wins in 164 matches), followed by Djokovic with 68.8% (229 wins in 333 matches) and Becker with 65.1% (121 wins in 186 matches).

The Mallorcan will take on World No. 12 Cameron Norrie in the final. The Brit scored a commanding victory over World No. 4 Stefanos Tsitsipas in the semifinals and is in red hot form.

However, Nadal will be the favorite to win the ATP 500 event, which would mark his fourth title in Acapulco.