Nadal plays his last match
The Netherlands won in a tie where the legend of tennis played forced. A bitter ending for Nadal: defeat, empty stands and a jeopardized title
‘I have not played as I have trained’. Rafa Nadal was blunt with his defeat to Van De Zandschulp by a double 6-4 in the quarterfinals of the Davis Cup being played in Malaga.
In addition, he let slip that a hypothetical semifinal would not be playing given his competitive level. A message to David Ferrer who, all indications are that he put Nadal in the first round as the lesser evil and trusted everything in Alcaraz, who won his match, and in a doubles duel where Nadal would have been more useful to Marcel Granollers than the Murcian.
Spain put the Davis Cup at risk for Rafa Nadal and came out on the wrong side of the coin. The best athlete of all time has been a little more than a year without performing at his highest level in competitions where no one person.
His intention was to retire in a full 2024 playing major tournaments. It all started in Australia with a heavy defeat in the second match against McDonald. De Miñaur ended his presence in the Conde de Godó in April, in Madrid he fell in the round of 16 and in Rome he did not get past the round of 32. In his great illusion, Roland Garros, it all ended in a draw that put him ahead of Zverev and a 3-0 lead that took him directly to the Olympic Games where he could not beat Djokovic and ended up eliminated in doubles with Alcaraz.
The controversy in those games was hardly echoed in Spain. Nadal arrived as 275th in the world after a year stopped by injuries, but used his protected ranking to go to the Paris event, something that annoyed Pedro Martinez, 48th in the world at the time.
‘In this case the protected ranking is an injustice because neither of us (Nadal and Carreño) has missed an Olympic Games because of injury, beyond Rafa, who we all want to see in the Olympics, including me as a fan’ and added to Relay that ’I do not see it as completely fair. It's like if I get injured now and in four years I use the protected ranking in the Los Angeles Games,’ he added, extending his complaint.
For reasons that no one knows, Nadal has gone to two important appointments for Spanish tennis forced by circumstances. Being in Paris and winning a medal was an impossible dream in view of his absence, injuries and the level of the other players.
Afterwards, his presence in the Davis Cup as a farewell has been a failure. Nothing of what was expected in Malaga happened as expected. The player from Manacor played the first match because his defeat was expected, but Alcaraz and the doubles were trusted. It all ended in an elimination with the stands of the Martin Carpena almost empty and a tribute that should never have taken place almost at midnight on a weekday.
In sporting terms, the salad bowl was compromised by the presence of Rafa Nadal. A day earlier, Spain had taken out its nails on Morata for letting Pedri take a penalty in an official match. The Milan player wanted the Barça midfielder to score a goal on home soil, but he missed the spot-kick and alarm bells went off as to whether such a thing should be allowed in an official match. These are the risks of using this type of event for the greater glory of sportsmen and women without thinking about the consequences.
No withdrawal is perfect. Federer's was not and Nadal's has not been. In recent months, perhaps Kroos's has been perfect. The group of sycophants that revolves around Nadal in the media has not helped either, but rather has tried to keep alive an impossible hope by recalling the sporting miracles of a guy who has transcended the world of tennis.
Nadal has already retired. We will no longer see him on the clay of Paris or playing impossible points. It was nice while he won. Then it wasn't.
