Rafael Nadal's lack of full fitness was evident even before the competition began. He nevertheless succeeded in defeating each of his opponents thus far and progressing to the 2022 Wimbledon semifinals.
But in his fifth encounter, he seemed to be physically hurt much more than in the others, and he also lost two sets for the first time this year in the competition. Images from Rafael Nadal and Taylor Fritz's Wimbledon 2022 quarterfinal match reveal the Spanish star plainly suffering from an abdominal muscle injury.
The Spaniard has faced challenging situations on the tennis court before, but it is unusual to see members of his team express their desire to leave the match. After the match, Nadal admitted that he was asked by his team to retire, but he fought and advanced to the semifinals.
“They told me I need to retire the match, yeah. Well, I tried. For me was tough to retire in the middle of the match. Not easy even if I had that idea for such a long time [in the match].“But in the other hand, I did it a couple of times in my tennis career. Is something that I hate to do it. So I just keep trying."
“Doctor came, give me some anti-inflammatories. The physio just tried to relax a little bit the muscle there. But it's difficult. Nothing can be fixed when you have a thing like this. I just wanted to give myself a chance. Not easy to leave the tournament. Not easy to leave Wimbledon, even if the pain was hard. I wanted to finish. Doesn't matter. Well, I prefer to win, with victory or defeat. That's what I did. I fighted. Proud about the fighting spirit and the way that I managed to be competitive under those conditions.”
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