Everyone understands how you must be beat Nadal.  You’ve got to take the game to him.  Even a player like Andy Murray, more inclined to defense than offense, knows to play Nadal, you must take charge.  Nadal is better than anyone in the world punishing you for mistakes.  Leave a ball short, and he’ll pulverize it for a winner, and even should he play a bit more cautious, he’ll pressure you with inside-in shots until you do drop a ball short, and then he’ll inside-out that shot, and you’ll be left gasping.

There’s two things that rarely happen to Nadal.  Nadal rarely loses to a fellow Spaniard.  Nadal rarely loses to anyone ranked below 30.  Up to this point, Nadal’s only low-ranked loss was to Spaniard, Feliciano Lopez, at Queen’s.  Lopez had not beaten Nadal, up to that point, since their very first meeting when Lopez was more the veteran, and Nadal was the upstart.  Lopez was ranked 31 at the time, and the loss appeared strategic.  Fresh off a win at Roland Garros, Nadal could be forgiven for not wanting to jeopardize his chances to win Wimbledon.

Guillermo Garcia-Lopez is ranked a lowly 53 in the world.  He’s only ever played Nadal twice, once in 2005 in Valencia, and once again in 2008, in Chennai, both easy straight-set losses.  Here he was playing the match of his life against perhaps the best Spaniard ever out in the capital of Thailand, one of the few ATP 250 events a top player like Nadal will play.  Fresh off his win at the US Open, Nadal was hoping for a routine victory, but he got nothing of the kind.

Perhaps a player like Gilles Simon understands Garcia-Lopez.  In a 2008 match in Madrid, then held indoors, Simon saved 17 of 22 break points.  When Nadal is on, he gets his break points and to win, you must save them often.  Djokovic felt this wrath during the US Open and failed to save enough break points.

Garcia-Lopez’s save percentage was even more gaudy, saving a ridiculous 24 of 26 break points.  When a player of the caliber of Nadal assaults you that often, he expects to win.  Nadal won the first set easily, at 6-2, but Garcia-Lopez won enough key points to push the second set into a tiebreak which he won handily.

In the third set, Garcia-Lopez served first and secured a break at 2-1, when Nadal chose to play a drop shot on break point and Garcia-Lopez chased it down, hit the ball cross-court with his one-handed backhand, and elicited an error from Nadal.  This break point was the only one Garcia-Lopez had seen all day, but it would be enough.  Garcia-Lopez served well to secure the break to 4-1.

Nadal had a comfortable hold to 4-2, and had chances as Garcia-Lopez missed enough first serves to keep things interesting.  Alas, Nadal errors let Garcia-Lopez hold serve.  Nadal had another strong hold, but Garcia-Lopez righted the ship, serving another strong game to secure the 6-3 third set upset.

Final score: 2-6, 7-6(3), 6-3.

Garcia-Lopez will face another lefty in the final, veteran Finnish player, Jarkko Nieminen, who beat Benjamin Becker handily in the other semis.

The other Asian tournament is in Malaysia, in the capital, Kuala Lumpur.  Andrey Golubev, who upset Robin Soderling, is in a battle with David Ferrer.  Golubev has won the first set.  The winner takes on Mikhail Youzhny, who beat Igor Andreev, in three sets.  Neither of the final two sets were close.