After eight o’clock on Thursday afternoon in London, Rafael Nadal went to a press conference. A serious gesture accompanies the Spaniard, who was facing an audience that already knew in advance that bad news was coming: “If I’m here it’s because I have to retire. I have a torn abdominal,” he explained.
The annoyance came from days ago, practically since the tournament began. In one of his first games, protective tape was seen on his stomach that triggered small alarms that stopped completely before the press. “I don’t want to talk about my physique, I want to talk about tennis,” he snapped.
The passing of the days improved the forecasts and he came to remove the protections in his last matches. But against Taylor Fritz, the abdominal reached its limits, it broke in the fourth game of the match and, although he continued to beat the American, the damage was already too great.
Nadal spent the night and this Thursday thinking about what decision to make. For the third consecutive participation here he was in the semifinals, two games away from the Grand Slam that has resisted him for the longest time. He hasn’t won it since 2010. He hasn’t reached a final since 2011. And again he leaves London without the cup. This time he did not stop Novak Djokovic, as in 2018, nor Roger Federer, as in 2019. He threw his body at him.
“Here the only thing worth winning is for me; the rest doesn’t help me much,” said Nadal, aware that, in addition, in this edition the tournament does not distribute points due to the sanction against Russians and Belarusians and that the only objective is to fatten the record of 22 Grand Slams that he already owns.
“It is practically impossible to think about winning two matches at this level with a torn abdominal. I was thinking all day what decision to make, but there is no point in trying. If I continue the injury it will be worse. I am very sad,” he added.
The Spaniard leaves Wimbledon with a 19-0 in Grand Slams this season. He maintains his unbeaten record in the saddest way, unable to fight it on the track. Seven wins in Melbourne, seven in Paris and five in London, without the possibility of looking for a sixth.
Nadal pushed to the limit. This Thursday he had scheduled a training session on track 10 of the All England Club, in full view of the world, but he decided to take refuge in the Aorangi, where access was restricted.
Not even the media could see the training of the Spaniard, who decided to go down to one of the most remote tracks, where only his team could glimpse his state.
There he made one last attempt. Some tests of the serve, the most complicated blow to do with the problem that drags in the abdomen. That she tasted it was a good sign. He went home after training and around 7:30 p.m. in London, his team announced that Nadal was at the All England Club and that he would speak half an hour later to the media.
A few minutes later it was already an open secret that he would leave. Nobody would call a press conference to say that he would play the next day.
“Logic, and after talking a lot with the team, leads me to make a decision that has cost me a lot. It’s what I feel. I think I made the right decision,” he reflected.
“As many times we have played under difficult circumstances, and sometimes it has ended in success, there is always hope that this can be one of them.”
“It comes at a time when the foot is a little better, which was the most worrying thing to be able to continue with my career… It seems that now the foot is more controlled and it is allowing me to enjoy being able to play tennis. I risk an injury that could take me a long time without playing… I try to prioritize what is my personal happiness beyond any title or personal success. When I play doing certain things, people may think it’s ambition, but it’s because I do what I feel and I do it with the conviction that I am doing the right thing, without putting my future or health at risk”.
With this defeat, against his physique, not against a rival, Nadal ends the dream of winning the four Grand Slams, an achievement that only Don Budge, in 1938, and Rod Laver, in 1962 and 1969, have achieved in history. In fact, in the Open Era, only Novak Djokovic had been able to reach this point in the season, a Wimbledon semifinal, with a chance of qualifying for the Grand Slam. He did it last year, when he ended up losing in the US Open final against Russia’s Daniil Medvedev.
The American Taylor Fritz, eliminated in the quarterfinals by Rafael Nadal, rejected the hypothesis of entering as a ‘lucky loser’ (lucky loser) in the semifinals of Wimbledon due to the loss of the Spanish due to injury and said he does not want “alms”.
Despite the fact that the possibility of a tennis player replacing another injured in the middle of the tournament is not contemplated in the regulations, the American met those who told him on social networks that he would have to play the semifinal against the Australian Nick Kyrgios.
“I’m not looking for handouts,” Fritz said on Instagram. “If I couldn’t beat him on the court, I don’t deserve to be in the semifinals. Simple as that,” he added.
The ‘lucky loser’ rule only applies to those tennis players who cannot get past the qualifying phase of a tournament and who enter the final draw as a second-rounder due to the loss of another player.
Once the tournament begins, that no longer happens and the tennis players who do not play a match because their rival is injured and retires go directly to the next round, as Kyrgios will do, who will not have to play the semifinals and will wait for the British in the final Cameron Norrie or Serbian Novak Djokovic.
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