• US Open, Men's Draw

Nadal revelling in 'dream' US Open win

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Rafael Nadal has admitted completing his career Grand Slam with victory at the US Open has exceeded his wildest dreams.

Nadal produced one of the finest performances of his career to fend off the challenge of a brilliant Novak Djokovic to claim a 6-4 5-7 6-4 6-2 win. The Spaniard is the youngest player in the Open era to win all four grand slams and it is a feat he is immensely proud of.

"I'm still 24. For me, it's a dream to have the career Grand Slam, but this is more a dream to have the US Open," he said. "[It's an] unbelievable feeling because I worked a lot all my life, in all difficult moments to be here, but I never imagined to have the four grand slams. To have my hands on this trophy is unbelievable."

Nadal is peerless at present, having won his last 21 matches at the slams, but the Majorcan is unlikely to rest on his laurels and is spying improvement on a surface he has so far failed to conquer: indoors.

"My goal remains for me the [ATP World Tour Finals]. It is probably the last big tournament that I didn't win," he said. "That's true it's the most difficult title for me to win because we play it indoors, and when indoor, indoor is a very quick surface, so it is going to be always very difficult if we don't change that. But at the same time it is a challenge for me to keep improving to have the chance to play well there and to have the chance to win, so that's what I'm going try this year.

"For me right now the next goal is try to finish the season much better than what I did in other years. The last part of the season always was difficult for me. Well, today it started to be less difficult, that's true. But I want to finish the season if it's possible with a good feeling."

Djokovic backed up his win over Roger Federer in the semi-finals with a fantastic display, but he came up against a player who was too good.

The world No. 1 was overcome with emotion after sealing victory © Getty Images

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"Maybe emotionally I was a little bit drained after the semi-final match, but I recovered," Djokovic said. "I had two days, and I was motivated to win this match, and this is one of the matches where the opponent plays better than you, and you just have to congratulate him and tell him, 'You're better.' That's it. I don't think I played a bad match overall. It was very good performance from my side. But whenever it was important, he was the one who was playing just too good."

It could be argued Nadal is already the finest player to pick up a racket, but even if he is not there yet Djokovic believes he can be.

"He has the capabilities already now to become the best player ever," Djokovic said. "I think he's playing the best tennis that I ever seen him play on hard courts. He has improved his serve drastically. The speed, the accuracy, and of course his baseline is as good as ever. So he's a very complete player."

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