Rafael Nadal powered his way to a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Andy Murray on a windy Sunday afternoon at the BNP Paribas Open, winning his second Indian Wells title in three years.
No. 1 Nadal’s low, hard groundstrokes gave him an edge in the gusty conditions over No. 4 Murray, whose game relies more on pace and a mix of shots.
Nadal, a 22-year-old Spaniard, added the championship to the Australian Open title he won earlier this year, and avenged a loss to Murray in the Rotterdam final.
Vera Zvonareva defeated defending champion Ana Ivanovic 7-6 (5), 6-2 to win the women’s title. Zvonareva a day earlier teamed with Victoria Azarenka to take the women’s doubles.
Nadal rode his usual powerful forehands to the lopsided win over Murray, hitting 10 winners from that side to Murray’s one. Nadal also was efficient at the net, winning eight of 11 points to Murray’s 5-of-10.
With the swirling wind making the service toss difficult, neither player served an ace.
No. 6 Zvonareva was the steadier player in the women’s title match.
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With the gusts making even some routine shots extremely tricky, the 24-year-old Russian made far fewer mistakes than her Serbian opponent.
Zvonareva joined Lindsay Davenport as the only women to win the singles and doubles title at Indian Wells in the same year. Davenport did it twice, in 1997 and 2000.
In the singles final this time, the wind swirled around the stadium in the 40-mph range, with both players often tossing the ball to serve only to have to catch it and try again.
Serving on the first point of the tiebreaker, Ivanovic tossed the ball up, it went sailing some three feet behind her, bounced on the court and kept bouncing away, swept off the court by the wind.
Ivanovic finally served and won the point, but a string of errors cost her the rest of the tiebreaker and plagued her in the second set.
Zvonareva, who won her ninth career singles title and second of the year, made 23 unforced errors, half of Ivanovic’s total. Ivanovic also had five double faults, Zvonareva one.
Those mistakes negated Ivanovic’s winners—she hit 29 to Zvonareva’s five.
The victory evened Zvonareva’s record against Ivanovic to 4-4.
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