Rafael Nadal insists he is ‘at peace’ after giving everything he had to tennis as he prepares his final bow as a professional.
The ultimate master of clay, Nadal is set to end a career that began 23 years ago by representing Spain at the Davis Cup in Malaga, and will leave Novak Djokovic as the last of tennis’s ‘Big Three’ still standing.
Like his great rival Roger Federer before him, Nadal’s impending retirement was not a decision of his own choosing, but rather his body leaving him little choice, even if he has few regrets.
“I achieved the most important thing for me,” Nadal said from a hotel conference center outside Malaga. “Because this day has come and I am at peace because I gave everything I had. I’ve been playing and practicing since I was eight years old – I mean, I started at three years old – but at that age I started working more and more with passion, with love, with the determination to be the best you can be.
He added: “I will leave this professional tour with the calm and with the personal satisfaction of giving the best of myself almost every moment.”
It’s still very likely that Nadal’s final farewell will be postponed, and there’s a small chance that it won’t happen at all. But with tickets on resale sites selling for more than €1,000 (£835), the tournament and the Spanish FA will want the match to go ahead.
Due to injuries affecting the latter stages of his career, it remains to be seen whether Nadal will be fit enough to play singles, and the Davis Cup doubles is usually played only as a decider.
If Spain wins both singles matches against the Netherlands on Tuesday, it would advance to the next round without needing a doubles match, and there is also a chance it could lose both, and would then need decide whether or not she wants to play. playing a sort of exhibition, which Nadal does not want to do.
Nadal’s farewell not only overshadowed the Billie Jean King Cup, but began to dominate the city of Malaga.
The roads leading to the arena were adorned at regular intervals with signs proclaiming “Gracias Rafa» and there is a huge mural on the athletics track in front of the Palacio de Deportes tennis stadium. The standard press conference room at the José María Martín Carpena Stadium was not considered sufficient to interest the world’s media, who were transported by coach along the coast to the team hotel.
Despite the fanfare surrounding the farewell and even though emotions crept into his voice during the press conference, Nadal remained resolute about tennis.
“The most important thing here is to try to help the team and stay focused on what we need to do, which is to play tennis and do it very well. So the emotions will be on the end and, before and during, it will be about focusing on what we need to do.
Nadal to retire from tennis having won 22 Grand Slam tournaments, including a record 14 at Roland Garros and 92 ATP Tour titles. The player who has become synonymous with clay, perhaps more than any other player on any surface in history, after losing just three matches at Roland Garros, accepts his own retirement.
“I’m not worried about the next chapter of my life,” he said. “I’ve always been happy without tennis and I’ve had a lot of times in my life where I couldn’t play tennis due to injuries, so I spent a lot of months doing other things.”
Despite this, Nadal admitted he would miss the adrenaline of professional sport, as tennis contemplates its future without two of the three giants of the game who have dominated the sport over the past two decades.
