'Part Of My Life Left With Him': Nadal Explains Being Emotional During Federer's Retirement

ATP
Tuesday, 05 March 2024 at 05:20
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Rafael Nadal is quite an interesting character who still remembers the day when Roger Federer hung up his racquet.

Nadal and Federer are intrinsically linked because of how their careers developed. Even if we strictly speak about their tennis careers, we can't talk about them without mentioning the other.

It's just impossible because so many of the greatest moments were shared between them regardless of who actually won. The rivalry progressed through stages.

It was heated early on and then developed into a very respectful one as they aged, and by the time they hit 30, they had even become friends. Still, it seems that Nadal can't really describe their relationship really well.

Sometimes Federer is a close friend, sometimes he's just somebody familiar, and sometimes it's even more than that. In a press conference in Las Vegas, as per publication People, Nadal said that part of him left when Federer retired at the Laver Cup, which is quite a strong statement.

"I got emotional because an important part of my professional life left. At the end of the day with Roger, we shared our most important moments in our tennis careers probably playing against each other."

Nadal was really emotional during the ceremony, even more so than Federer. He was crying, and it was a moment that made headlines all around the world. We haven't seen Nadal that emotional often, and that was also a reason why the scene was quite interesting.

"First of all [I was] emotional because probably the most elegant player that I ever seen left the tour. Second, as I said before, a part of my life left with him, but that thought never pushed me to any retirement."

Nadal recently returned at the Netflix Slam, in which he lost to Carlos Alcaraz, and he's going to continue his comeback at the ATP Masters 1000 tournament in Indian Wells.

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