R afael Nadal will be 36 by the end of this year’s FrenchOpen, but as he prepares for a clay-court season that he hopes will end with his 14th Roland Garros triumph and his 22nd Grand Slam title, he should be buoyed by one extraordinary statistic. Since hemade his tour-level debut 20 years ago, the Spaniard has never gone into a European clay-court campaign on the back of a better start to the season than hewill this year. Having won 20matches in a row dating back to his opening encounter of the year in Melbourne, Nadal finally lost for the first time in 2022 when he succumbed to Taylor Fritz in the final at IndianWells. Even that defeat had a huge asterisk against it as Nadal discovered two days later that he had suffered a stress fracture to a rib in his semi-final. He was in pain throughout the final and had trouble breathing. “This is not good news and I didn’t expect it,” Nadal wrote on Twitter after the injury was diagnosed on his return to Spain. “I’m devastated and sad because it comes after a great start to the season.” The injury is a significant setback to Nadal’s plans for the clay-court season. He is expected to be out of action for between four and six weeks, meaning that he will miss the Monte Carlo and Barcelona tournaments where he has so often dominated in the past. His participation in the Madrid and even Rome Masters 1000 events might also be in some doubt. This will be the first year Nadal has started his European clay-court campaign with only one defeat to his name after playing a full schedule in the first three months of the season. In 2013 he had also suffered only one loss, but had not started that season until the south American clay- court swing in February following a seven- month break because of injury. Although he has in the past wonmore matches going
into the European clay-court season, on each occasion he also sufferedmore defeats: 22 wins and six losses in 2008, 24 wins and three losses in 2009, 21 wins and three losses in 2014. What is evenmore astonishing about Nadal’s start to 2022 is the fact that for a while it had seemed that he might not even make the start line inMelbourne. After losing to Novak Djokovic in the semi-finals at Roland Garros last year, he had played only twomatches, both at Washington in August, in the next sevenmonths following the recurrence of a foot problem. Then, after finally beginning his comeback at an exhibition event in Abu Dhabi in December, the Spaniard tested positive for Covid. Having been “very sick” for several days, he thought it might be touch-and-go whether he would play in Australia. However, after a patchy start Nadal won his warm-up tournament inMelbourne, claimed his second Australian Open title by coming back from two sets down to beat Daniil Medvedev in the final and then triumphed in Acapulco without dropping a set. He also won ferocious battles in Indian Wells against Sebastian Korda, Nick Kyrgios and Carlos Alcaraz before finally losing to Fritz. Having decided tomiss the Miami Open, he will return to competition on his favourite surface inMonte Carlo in April. “I wanted tomake it perfect before clay,” Nadal admitted following his defeat to Fritz. “It would have been very, very, very beautiful. But I amnot the kind of person who goes down or goes very high emotionally depending on the moment. I amnormally stable. I put everything in perspective. Of course, the last twomonths have been amazing, unforgettable, very emotional. I’ve enjoyed things that a few months ago I thought I could never experience again. It has been amazing.” He added: “I’malmost 36. I’ve played muchmore than I had expected to at the beginning of the season. For my body, it’s not good to have quick transitions from
On top Down Under Rafael Nadal celebrates his victory at this year's Australian Open
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