Australian Open 2022 expert picks — Will Nadal break the Grand Slam record? Or will Medvedev capture another major title?

On Sunday (3:30 a.m. ET, ESPN/ESPN App), top-seeded Daniil Medvedev will take on Rafael Nadal in the Australian Open final. If Nadal wins, he will break the Grand Slam record that he, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer all currently hold, tied with 20 titles each.

A Nadal victory would be history-making, but is it likely? Our experts weigh in.

What does Nadal need to do to beat Medvedev?

Bill Connelly: In three wins over Medvedev, Nadal has won 55% of his second-serve points. He’s won 58% in this tournament. In his lone loss to Medvedev, however — a three-setter indoors in London in 2020 — he won only 37% of those points. Nadal has brought some extra service pop to the table during this fortnight, and if he can fend Medvedev off in this regard, he’ll give himself an excellent shot at his first Australian Open title in 13 years.

Brad Gilbert: Nadal needs a high percentage of aggressive serving and to get Serve plus one points, to use his forehand from center court and control the rallies, to take some cuts on second serve returns, and also, it’s important he try to vary his pace of shots to Medvedev.

Luke Jensen: Medvedev vs. Nadal is the perfect match-up to end the happy slam that started out not so happy with the Djoker drama. In 2019, Federer had match points against Djokovic at Wimbledon to reach 21 and fell short. In 2021, Djokovic was one win away in the US Open final and didn’t have enough to beat Medvedev. So now Nadal has his shot against Medvedev who he beat in the 2019 US Open final.

Like that 2019 match-up, it will take all of Rafael’s tactical intelligence to win. In that 2019 US Open final that went 5 sets to put down first time major finalist Medvedev, Nadal was running out of fuel and turned to timely serve and volley plays to keep the points short to pull out the win. Look for Nadal to use his slice backhands to keep the ball low and short to draw Medvedev off his comfortable baseline position. This is a difficult match-up for Nadal now because…