23-year-old Kazakh Jelena Rybakina was sitting in the press conference room, talking about how she managed to defeat Romania’s Simona Halep 6-3, 6-3 in the semifinals and advance to her first final at a Grand Slam tournament. when the whispering began among the reporters. Rafael Nadal will soon hold a press conference in this room, it was said. Since he had not played that Thursday and there was no obvious reason for an address to the media, it was clear: Nadal had something significant to announce, which, of course, was no longer a surprise. At least since Wednesday, when the Spaniard painfully won his quarter-final match against American Taylor Fritz after five sets, it was known that his abdominal muscles were really giving him problems.
Nadal showed up at 7:22 p.m., the hall was packed, and the 35-year-old immediately said: “Unfortunately, anyone can imagine that, since I’m here now, I have to pull out of the tournament. As everyone saw yesterday, I did Abdominal pain.” Already in the afternoon the representation appeared that he had even suffered a seven millimeter long tear in the abdominal muscle. Nadal did not confirm the extent of the injury, he only said: “I have a tear in my abdominal muscle.” This also ends the attempt to create the calendar Grand Slam, i.e. to win all four major titles within one year. Nadal won the Australian Open and the French Open in 2022.
He had only now appeared in front of the media because he had been thinking all day about what decision to make. Now he sounded clear: “I made my decision because I firmly believe that I cannot win two matches in a row under these circumstances.” He meant: the semi-final against Nick Kyrgios this Friday and a possible final on Sunday. The Australian Kyrgios is thus automatically the first finalist (Novak Djokovic and Cameron Norrie are now contesting the only semi-final). For the 27-year-old, one of the most dazzling characters on the tour, it will be the first final in a Grand Slam tournament.
Nadal says: “If I keep going, the injury will get worse and worse.”
The injury occurred a week ago, but he was still able to “control” it, Nadal said. After the game against Fritz, investigations apparently revealed: “This small thing became a bigger thing.” Nadal also pondered because in his injury-ridden career he had proven often enough that he could push his body beyond limits despite certain complaints. It was only at the last Grand Slam tournament in Paris, at the French Open, that he announced after winning his 14th title that he would have his chronically injured left foot injected before every match. On Thursday afternoon he had trained briefly and found out whether his abdominal muscles would allow him to exert himself fully. “It’s obvious,” he said, “as I keep going the injury will get worse and worse.”
He will now take three to four weeks shorter, then he hopes that this break will enable him to “do my normal calendar”. This should allow Nadal to compete at the US Open at the end of August. He doesn’t want to play for a week, then he plans to do light training from the baseline. Nadal also defended his decision that he continued his game against Fritz – despite father Sebastián and sister María Isabel signaling him to stop. “Yes, that was the right decision,” he said, “because I finished the match” – as the winner. Now, this Thursday, he had no choice.