Rafa Nadal succeeds where Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer failed with 21st Grand Slam

Rafael Nadal knew history could be made entering the Australian Open final but nobody expected it to pan out the way it did. The 'Big Three' had all been sitting on 20 Grand Slams apiece since Novak Djokovic won Wimbledon last summer.

Roger Federer was the first to reach the milestone achievement back in 2018 when he won Down Under.

Long before that, it looked highly unlikely that anybody would catch the Swiss tennis icon after his 17th title came in 2012.

At that time, Nadal was on 11 Grand Slams while Djokovic had five majors to his name.

Nadal continued his dominance at Roland Garros though over the last decade while Djokovic solidified his legacy as one of the greatest of all time.

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Still, it was Federer who had the first chance to break through the barrier to Grand Slam number 21.

He faced off against Djokovic in a five-set thriller at the 2019 Wimbledon final, only to miss out in an epic championship tiebreak.

Since then, Federer has battled injuries and undergone multiple surgeries on his knee with doubts on whether he will be able to compete at the highest level again.

Djokovic was next to have a crack at moving ahead of his rivals for that elusive 21st major last year in what would have given him the calendaar Grand Slam.

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But the Serbian lost out to Daniil Medvedev in straight sets, leaving him stuck on 20.

Meanwhile, Nadal was overcoming injury issues of his own which forced him to skip the 2021 US Open.

He even admitted towards the end of the year that retirement was a strong possibility as he wasn't sure how well he'd perform on his return.

But those concerns quickly disappeared with a title at the Melbourne Summer Set before