After losing in the quarterfinals of the 2022 Madrid Open, Rafael Nadal was aiming to go really far at the 2022 Italian Open in Rome, but he was stopped by Denis Shapovalov in the third round.
The experienced Spaniard was entering the match as a big favourite as he triumphed already twice against Shapovalov in Rome before. This time however, Rafael Nadal lost and will start focusing on the second Grand Slam of the season.
The match started perfectly for the 21-time Grand Slam champion. Nadal was solid on his service while breaking his opponent twice what led to a swift 6-1 win in the first set and it looked like it will be another easy day in the office for the Spaniard.
However, in the second set, Shapovalov broke Nadal already in the second set to quickly build a 4-1 lead in the second set. But the 2021 Italian Open champion then won 9 points in a row to later level the score to 4-4. The Canadian then broke his opponent's serve one more time to eventually win the set 7-5.
In the third set, Nadal started in a best possible way when he broke Shapovalov's very first service game. In the next game, he got broken back and the scoreline was soon showing 2-2. From then, Shapovalov won 14 points in a row to eventually win the match 1-6, 7-5, 6-2 and move to the 2022 Italian Open quarterfinals.
At the press conference after the match, Nadal admitted that especially during the third set, he was troubled by an injury, when he said: “I felt a lot of pain in my foot. I am not injured but it is not easy to live with this situation. It's frustrating. Tonight in the middle of the second set I started to suffer."
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