Rafael Nadal becomes US Open champion by wining over Novak Djokovic

Rafael Nadal joined the ranks of the all-time greats of tennis as he beat Novak Djokovic to win the US Open and complete his set of Grand Slam titles, according to BBC News.

The Spaniard, 24, won a rain-interrupted final 6-4 5-7 6-4 6-2 at Flushing Meadows in New York.

Nadal's first US Open victory takes him to nine Grand Slam titles. And he becomes only the seventh man in history to complete the set of majors - Wimbledon, the French, Australian and US Opens.

Nadal joins Roger Federer, Andre Agassi, Roy Emerson, Rod Laver, Don Budge and Fred Perry in having swept the board, and also becomes the first man since Laver in 1969 to win the French Open, Wimbledon and US Open in the same year.

"That's more than I dreamt," Nadal said at the trophy presentation. "It's just amazing to be here in this final, just to arrive in this final. To have this trophy here in a few seconds, with my hands, is going to be unbelievable."

Neither the New York rain, which had seen the final postponed on Sunday and then interrupted for nearly two hours on Monday, nor Djokovic could halt the Spaniard's relentless march to the one title that still eluded him.

There was a case to be made for Djokovic going into the final, not least because he had defeated five-time champion Roger Federer in a dramatic semi-final and had a 7-3 record against Nadal on hard courts, but the world number one is a different animal in major finals.