Beaten Nadal happy with performance
His scratchy form on hard courts may have continued, but Rafael Nadal was happy despite his Western and Southern Open loss.
Rafael Nadal felt he produced one of his better recent performances during his third-round loss to Feliciano Lopez at the Western and Southern Open.
The 14-time grand slam champion was beaten 5-7 6-4 7-6 (7-3) in Cincinnati on Thursday as his unconvincing hard-court form continued.
For Nadal, it meant his record on the surface this year is 11-6 ahead of the US Open, which starts on August 31.
But the Spaniard said he had performed as expected during his loss – his second in a row to his countryman.
"I was there during the whole match with the right intensity, with the right attitude, doing the things that I have to do, trying to be more aggressive, trying to go to the net more often," Nadal told the ATP World Tour website.
"That's what I did. But I played against an opponent that he played a fantastic match, I think. He played the best match ever against me, without a doubt.
"For me it's a tough loss because I was playing better and my feelings on court were better than they were before."
Nadal was knocked out in the quarter-finals in Montreal and failed to get even that far in Cincinnati, a worrying run as he aims for a third US Open title.