High stakes for Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic as they go toe to toe in Roland Garros

It should come as no surprise, even in autumn and in the midst of a pandemic, that Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic will meet in another French Open final.

Djokovic is No. 1 and has not lost a completed match in this disjointed 2020 tennis season. Nadal is No. 2 and the greatest clay-court player in the game’s long history.

Nadal will be aiming for his 13th French Open title, a preposterous total for any event, much less a Grand Slam tournament. Djokovic is aiming for his second.

Both advanced Friday with victories over younger men who had reason to hope for better. Nadal won, 6-3, 6-3, 7-6 (0), against No. 12 seed Diego Schwartzman, who upset him on clay in the Italian Open last month. Djokovic won, 6-3, 6-2, 5-7, 4-6, 6-1, against No. 5 Stefanos Tsitsipas, who had already beaten him twice and who pushed him to five sets this time before his legs, if not his will, gave out.

But Sunday’s showdown — the 56th match in the rich rivalry between Nadal and Djokovic, and their third meeting in the French Open final — will be about more than winning this unique October edition of Roland Garros.

It will be about the historical pecking order. If Nadal prevails, he will equal Roger Federer’s men’s record of 20 Grand Slam singles titles. If Djokovic prevails, he will narrow the gap with his longtime rivals. The title would be his 18th and would make him the first of the so-called Big Three to win each of the four majors twice.

Numbers, so many numbers. It is part of their legacy, and at times, their burden.

Djokovic has the overall edge against Nadal, with a 29-26 advantage, but Nadal leads by 17-7 on clay and by 6-1 at Roland Garros.

Djokovic is one of only two men to have defeated Nadal in this tournament. Robin Soderling beat Nadal in the fourth round in 2009, and Djokovic beat him in the quarterfinals in 2015, a rare downbeat year in Nadal’s career.

Nadal is bracing himself for Sunday’s final.

“I made a step forward today and played my best match of the tournament,” he said. “I will need one on Sunday that is even better.”

Djokovic is shoring up the fortifications, too.

“It’s his ‘maison,’ ” he said of Nadal, using the French word for house. “I will have to be at my best. Playing Nadal at Roland Garros is the biggest challenge in our sport.”

Djokovic has certainly had the harder road to the final. While Nadal has not dropped a set in six matches, Djokovic has dropped three in his last two — going four sets with Pablo Carreño Busta in the quarterfinals and five with Tsitsipas, the swashbuckling 22-year-old Greek.

Djokovic was in control until he served for a straight-set victory at 5-4 in the third set and, on match point, missed a backhand just wide going for a winner. Tsitsipas rallied to win the next three games and the set.

Tsitsipas defeated Federer to reach his first Grand Slam semifinal at the 2019 Australian Open and also won last year’s ATP Finals, often considered the fifth most prestigious event in men’s tennis, after the majors.

But he has struggled to close of late, blowing six match points against Borna Coric in a third-round loss at the US Open. Though his hunger was palpable Friday and his comeback inspired, he could not cross the finish line ahead of Djokovic, the elastic Serbian who at age 33 was the fresher man.

“My body was not ready,” Tsitsipas said wearily.

If Nadal prevails in the final, he will have won 100 matches at the French Open.

But for once, the focus will not be on Nadal’s running total at Roland Garros. It will be on his pursuit of Federer’s Grand Slam singles record.

Federer, 39, won his 20th major title at the 2018 Australian Open, but Nadal has steadily narrowed the gap since then — winning the French Open twice more and the US Open in 2019 to bring his total to 19.

Nadal, true to character, has downplayed the chase.

“I am happy with who I am,” he said, tapping his chest with an index finger, in an interview with The New York Times earlier this year. “I was very happy with 16, very happy with 17, very happy with 18, very happy with 19, and if one day I get to 20, I will be very happy, too. But my level of happiness is not going to change because of this.”

When pressed, he has acknowledged that he is not immune to the lure of the history books. “I understand these things, and it’s good for tennis that people talk about this,” he said Friday. “But I am living my own reality, and when it’s finished and it’s achieved or not, it will be talked about.”

Nadal has always been more interested in looking forward to the next point, the next match, the next challenge than looking back at all the castles he has built on the clay and elsewhere.

It is his not-so-secret weapon — that deep focus on process over destination.

“It’s important to go through all the process,” he said. “You have to suffer. You can’t pretend to be in a final of Roland Garros without suffering.”

Though he was the reigning champion at the US Open, he decided not to play in New York this year. He believed that the trip to the United States might wear him down for the abbreviated clay-court season, with the French Open starting just two weeks after the men’s US Open final.

So far, so smart, but he is on new ground here. He has never won the French Open without winning a clay-court tournament in the lead-up. His forehand is not bouncing as high in the cool conditions. His serve is not traveling as quickly: It is down, on average, 4 mph from 2019.

Despite all of the above, Nadal, 34, is into the final without being seriously challenged.

Greatness is in the details, and Nadal is, contrary to popular image, a great tactician as well as a great athlete, ball striker and competitor.

He went on to win the third-set tiebreaker, too, and is now just one victory away from ruling again at Roland Garros. It has been a reign like no other, but this is a French Open like no other.

“Obviously the conditions are different than the ones that we are used to playing in May and June,” Djokovic said. “I think that could be a better chance for me, obviously the ball not bouncing as high over the shoulder as he likes it usually. Regardless of the conditions, he’s still there. He’s Rafa, he’s in the finals and we’re playing on clay.”