Australian Open 2007: last 16. Nadal won 6-7, 6-4, 4-6, 6-3, 6-1 Their first meeting, and arguably their best so far. Murray, then 19, hadn't dropped a set going into the match and looked unbeatable as he went 4-1 up in the second, only for his serve to desert him.The weather was good, the beaches enticing and the odd fishing trip a distraction, but Rafael Nadal was hurting badly on this day last year as his life hit unexpected turbulence far away from Wimbledon fortnight.
He was back home in Mallorca after beating a retreat the weekend before the Championships, having realised that his troublesome knees could not take two weeks of competition.
So turned off was Nadal that he could barely bring himself to switch on and watch his rivals at the tournament where he should have been defending his title. 'I saw the whole of the final and a bit of a quarterfinal, but not much.' he recalled.
'This wasn't an easy time for me with my knees and there were a few problems at home, too.'
His latter comment refers to the separation of his parents earlier in the year, a devastating blow for someone who values close-knit family ties as much as anything else in life.
Twelve months earlier his father Sebastian and mother Ana Maria had witnessed his greatest triumph in the Sunday evening gloaming of SW19 when he beat Roger Federer in arguably the best Wimbledon final ever. They joined their son afterwards at the Champions' Dinner celebrations in Mayfair.
Happily, Nadal is now much closer to the bliss of 2008 than the upheavals of 2009, having returned to his best form and rude health in defiance of what many predicted, more out of fear for him than any ill will.
Wimbledon 2008: quarter-final. Nadal won 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 Murray had nothing left to give following his monumental fightback against Richard Gasquet in the previous round. The Scot, complete with muscleman pose, was overpowered.The 24-year-old Spaniard is an extremely popular figure, drawing the admiration of the millionaires with whom he shares a locker room and the legions who flock for his autograph. In a recent straw poll of staff at the AEGON Championships at Queen's Club, his name featured among those players who displayed the best manners and most friendly attitude.
Yet his geniality should not be confused with softness and it is only through single -minded determination that he has got back to a peak which sees him installed as favourite to reclaim the title he won two years ago.
Take the visit of the Queen to Wimbledon last week. Nadal is no republican and is close to the Spanish royal family, who are among his most loyal supporters. Nevertheless, he declined to join the parade of top seeds being introduced to Her Majesty shortly before lunch.
There were vague excuses that it clashed with his practice when it did not. As he stays in a house just two minutes walk from the All England Club, it would have been easy for him to have fitted it in, with his match due to start around four hours later.
As it turned out, he simply did not want to do anything that might distract him on match day, although he would have been honoured to have met the Queen afterwards, by which time she had gone. It was going to be on his terms, not hers. But then he is fired by a burning desire to show that winning Wimbledon was not a one-off, just as his great rival Federer has shown over the years.
US Open 2008: semi-final. Murray won 6-2, 7-6, 4-6, 6-4 Murray dominated the world No 1 in a match played over two days because of rain, switching from his trademark counter-attacking style and taking the match to his opponent.Andre Agassi once ventured that, in fitness terms, Nadal was 'writing cheques that his body can't cash' and the key to his revival has been the successful management of his knee problems.
Apart from the usual regime of strengthening exercises, there has been a slight reduction in his playing schedule, such as disappointing his fans by making a lat e withdrawal from April's Barcelona Open - one of his favourite events - purely in order to rest.
Then there has been recent treatment using the increasingly popular technique of 'blood spinning', the re-injection of his own blood into the knee after the cells have been separated in order to speed repair of the tendons.
His left knee has been treated this way already and once Wimbledon is over the right one will be tackled in a similar manner.
While there is still intermittent soreness, the situation has dramatically improved since the end of last year when he came to the Barclays ATP Tour World Finals at London's O2 Arena and lost all three group matches.
This season Nadal's match record has steadily grown to 45-5, by far the best of any player, and he has lost only once in his last 29 outings. The sun, sea and sorrow of 12 months ago seems a long way back.
Australian Open 2010: quarter-final. Murray won 6-3, 7-6, 3-0 (Nadal retired) A victory tinged with regret for the Scot, who insisted he was 'gutted' for his friend and rival after seeing him limp out of their clash in Melbourne in January with a knee injurysource: dailymail
