Following Rafael Nadal's thrilling comeback in the 2022 Australian Open Final, there has been a lot of discussion about where this final ranks compared to other great grand slam finals.
Whilst there always is some recency bias involved, there is no doubt that last Sunday night's match was within the top ten grand slam finals of all time.
What was most impressive of all about this win, however, wasn't the match itself or any of the rounds prior. Instead, it was the fact that 'Rafa' fought through the toughest of adversity to take home his record-breaking 21st grand slam title.
As he revealed in his interview following his big win, "A month and a half ago I didn't know if I would play tennis again at a professional level due to various factors, including the problems I've had with my foot and with COVID."
In order to determine which grand slam final matches since 2000 have been the best, we look through two different criteria:
1. The quality of the match
2. The length of the match (has to be a 5-setter)
3. What it meant for the world of tennis with breaking records etc
Here's our top ten.
10. 2020 Australian Open Final: Novak Djokovic (SRB) vs Dominic Thiem (AUT)
Scoreline: Djokovic wins 6-4, 4-6, 2-6, 6-3, 6-4
The formula was simple for Novak Djokovic: Win and you regain the world number one spot. Lose and you stay world number two.
Coming up against him on this night was Austrian big hitter Dominic Thiem who had seemingly found career-best form and whilst being an underdog, appeared a decent chance.
Early on, Novak got the first set pretty easily and things were going perfectly to plan.
However, an early break in the second set brought about a sense of confidence within Thiem who would go on to win the next two sets reasonably comfortably.
Most negative of all, Djokovic seemed to have all the life sucked out of him in that horrid third set.
Despite this, Novak managed to demonstrate how insanely good his defence is to eventually claim his eighth Australian Open, his 17th Grand Slam and most importantly return to the number one ranking in the world; a record he still has today.
