Rafael Nadal has admitted that much of his struggles in the past ATP seasons have been on the mental side. The Spaniard is now showing that he’s on his way to recovery—and regaining the confidence that brought him to the top of tennis—gaining ground on the leaders of the ATP Rankings by placing World No. 5 in its latest update.

The 29-year-old Nadal rose to fifth place, up from the previous ranking of sixth a week ago. He has a total 4,630 points in 22 tournaments played this season, ahead by just 10 points over Tomas Berdych, who dropped one place and now ranked World No. 6.

From June to July 2015, Nadal ranked World No. 10 in the ATP Rankings—his lowest in years since becoming World No. 1 from October 2013 to June 2014. Nadal is still chasing the elite players in tennis with Novak Djokovic expectedly holding on to the World No. 1 spot, Andy Murray at no. 2, Roger Federer at no. 3 and Stan Wawrinka at no. 4.

Nadal, who has won 14 Grand Slam titles, majority of which from his specialty and favourite, the French Open, has struggled with various injuries the last two seasons. Nadal has suffered injuries to his foot, knee and wrist, among others, that has caused him to miss some of the major tournaments in the ATP tour.

However, Nadal has performed well at the tail end of the 2015 season. Nadal made the final of the China Open losing to rival Djokovic, 2-6 2-6; the semifinal of the Shanghai Masters losing to Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, 4-6 6-0 5-7; the final of the Swiss Indoors Basel losing to Federer, 3-6 7-5 3-6; and most recently, the quarterfinal of the BNP Paribas Masters losing to Wawrinka, 6-7 (8) 6-7 (7).

Nadal has a chance to gain more ground on the ATP Rankings leaders, as he is set to participate in the season-finale ATP World Tour Finals set from Nov. 15 to Nov 22 in London featuring the top players this season namely Djokovic, Federer, Murray, Wawrinka, Kei Nishikori, Tomas Berdych and Milos Raonic. Marin Cilic and/or David Ferrer could possibly join the tournament in case of injuries or pull out from the top eight.

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