Horacio Zeballos denied Rafael Nadal a fairytale finish to his comeback tournament on Sunday, rallying to hand the Spaniard a rare clay court defeat in the $410,200 ATP event here.
Zeballos, ranked 73rd in the world and playing in just his second ATP Tour final, rallied to beat the former world number one 6-7 (2/7), 7-6 (8/6), 6-4.
He became just the third player along with Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer to beat Nadal in a clay court final, quite an achievement for the Argentinian despite the fact that Nadal was playing his first tournament in seven months.
Nadal was back in action this week for the first time since a surprise second-round exit at Wimbledon in June.
Now ranked fifth in the world, 11-time Grand Slam champion Nadal was the top seed and had lost just 14 games en route to the final.
The 26-year-old had played down his expectations coming into the week, saying he still felt some pain in the knee and just wanted to get in as many matches as possible to regain his sharpness.
Zeballos, who posted his first win over a top 10 player in three attempts, joined Aussie Bernard Tomic as first-time winners on the tour this year.
