Rafael Nadal's comeback in Brisbane closes with a bittersweet aftertaste. Two triumphs, an exciting parade, a defeat—anecdotal, because what concerns him now is not the result—and concern. After a year away from competition, the champion of 22 majors has the first elements of judgment, which corroborate a double reality for the dreamers: his tennis and his combativeness are still there, astonishingly intact, but at the same time, his body remembered during the final stretch of this Friday's fight against Jordan Thompson —5-7, 7-6(6) and 6-3 in favor of the Australian, after 3h 25m— that the road back is going to be long and thorny, probably crude , as the protagonist has been insisting in recent times. Everything is uncertain.
He could have ended this episode – the third of the week, after the victories against Dominic Thiem and Jason Kubler – in a very different way, had he converted any of the three match points he had in the second set; However, Thompson escaped and the physical demands of the pulse meant that halfway through the third, already 4-1 down, Nadal had to go to the doctor to be treated for discomfort around the left inguinal region, the area that precisely stopped him a while ago. year and from which he was intervened in June. Just over a week before the start of the Australian Open, from the 14th to the 28th of this month, an unpleasant reminder. Logical, on the other hand. The tennis player went to the locker room, returned and finished the duel apparently well, but he refers to caution.
“I need to see how I wake up tomorrow morning,” he stated at the outset. “Honestly, now I'm not one hundred percent sure of anything,” he remarked in the conference room, specifying at the same time that the pain “was not relevant at all” and that he hopes to be able to exercise in the coming days to be able to attend the Melbourne event. “I know that after a year it is difficult for the body to be playing tournaments at the highest level. When things get tougher, you don't know how he's going to react. I need to accept everything as it comes. If things happen, if I have a problem there [en el psoas ilíaco] or in another part of the body, I have to accept it. It's a start. It had been a long time since I played a tournament,” he said.
After the tests against Thiem and Kubler, this time Nadal found a headwind. He did not blow in the Pat Rafter in Brisbane, again a sauna, but Thompson did, a tennis player who does not shine much in the showcase but who almost always contributes interesting arguments. He is astute, he knows how to play, he has an attractive range of resources—he is a regular at doubles—and he detected the Spaniard's insecurity during the first set. For the first time this week, the Majorcan (38 years old on June 3) grimaced and shook his head, reasoning with himself out loud. His will asks one thing of him, and reality tells him another. Step by Step. The process. In his game, the logical cracks derived from inactivity began to be seen, and as soon as the percentage of his first serves suffered a little, the curves began.
Necessary tolls
The situation is as dangerous as it is beneficial. In this return planned in the medium term – as the protagonist points out, pointing towards the earthly spring -, exposure to moments of tension and difficulty like this Friday will be as inevitable as it is necessary. Nadal must go through all the stations on his way back and after two great days, surprising for the high performance offered against Thiem and Kubler, the third match forced him to navigate through troubled waters, subjected to discomfort most of the time . He did not find a single truce, the inaccuracies surfaced. And Thompson wouldn't budge.
Still, Nadal experimented and tested himself, accepting the tolls. Doubt, however, had slipped through the cracks and Thompson, dynamic and immune to risks, a fearless guy who does not usually hesitate, decisively sought victory. The Australian (29 years old and 43rd in the world, mentioned this Saturday with Grigor Dimitrov) played with a knife between his teeth, hungry and defiant from start to finish, and although he lost the first set and a mental decline could be sensed, it turned out to be ephemeral. He persisted in the mission. He didn't bow down even when Nadal had him against the ropes. He drew three match points—one at 5-4 and two others in the tie-breaker— and led him definitively towards the physical stage, where he had everything to win.
In those, the Spaniard put his hand to his groin and went to his physio. He was treated by the organization's doctor and from there, a cool mind and closing of this first test in Brisbane, which offers one certainty: tennis-wise, Nadal is back. It remains to be seen how far his body will reach him.
“I HOPE IT'S JUST AN OVERLOAD”
A.C.
The day before the match with Thompson, Nadal highlighted that he had not had the need to invest too much time to resolve the duels with Thiem (1h 29m) and Kubler (1h 23m). On this occasion, however, he had to perform for almost three and a half hours.
“I have had the opportunity to play three games, and today the opponent played well. All the credit goes to him, he fought very hard. For my part, I'm happy with how the week went. It is a day to be happy and congratulate your rival. Then in the next few days we'll see how I feel. I must be calm,” he said, staying with the positive aspect of this first tournament, which he arrived at after just over a month of high-intensity training.
“If this is not important, it is a very positive week because I have played well; If I don't feel well, then we will do tests and review them,” she noted; “The only problem is that since the place is the same, you get a little more scared. I hope it's just overload. It is a very similar place to last year, but different things,” she said; “I feel more muscular, and last year it was the tendon. My muscle feels tired. I'm sure it's not the same, because then I felt something drastic, immediate. Today I haven't felt anything.”
“Like I said, I haven't come here to win tournaments now. Just to try to come back and do it in a positive way, and it has been positive,” Nadal concluded.
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