The Spanish Rafael Nadal lamented the injury that forced the German Alexander Zverev to retire in the semifinals of Roland Garros, which will allow him to play the final of the tournament for the fourteenth time, but he assured that he would change winning that final to recover his ill-fated foot left.
Nadal, who suffers from a chronic injury to that foot and who in the last tournament in Rome commented that it causes significant pain in his day-to-day life, assured that he would give the final next Sunday to recover of that problem.
“I’d rather lose the final”, he replied to the question of whether he would change a new title to heal his foot.
“Not having the pain I have every day changes your life. A new foot allows me to be happier day by day. Winning is nice, it fills you with momentary adrenaline, but life is more important than any title“said the Spaniard after qualifying for the final.
“After the race I have had, in which I have made an effort to adapt to problems, I have a life ahead of me and I would like to enjoy it, go play amateur sports with my friends, for example. Right now, that is unknown”, he added.
Nadal acknowledged that his match against Zverev was very close at the time of the injury and attributed it to the difficult conditions, with a lot of humidity, which it made the court slower and his shots generated less damage to the rival, but also the good game that the German displayed.
“These were unusual conditions here. The ball was heavy (…) It was necessary to suffer more to do damage, the blows did not create the effect and the feeling that the other could miss it. I think I could have done things better, but I can’t blame myself for anything, I’ve looked for solutions”, he indicated.
Nadal acknowledged that at the beginning of the second set he suffered a physical downturn, after snatching his rival’s service in the third game. He did it after a game with 44 exchanges that gave him a hard physical blow.
“I won the game but it took me a few points later. He was physically touched. You have to accept your limitations, I do what I can, I do my best, but I haven’t trained for three months and it shows in this kind of thing,” he said.
He assured that at the end of that set he already recovered some physical tone, which allowed him to take the match to the tiebreaker game, but at that moment the rival was injured.
Nadal considered playing a new final, in which he can lift the fourteenth title , is “unbelievable” after the last few months in which he has had many injuries, but indicated that it seemed more miraculous to him to have reached the final of the Australian Open earlier in the season.
“This is Roland Garros and although the preparation has been scarce, it is the most successful tournament of my career. I knew that if I went forward aspiration could come. Before starting I wasn’t the favourite, I was one of the candidates, but I said that in sport things change very quickly and you have to be prepared for it”, commented the Spaniard, who added that “the sacrifices make sense” when seeing oneself in the final.