Rafael Nadal suffered yet another injury setback just before the start of the Australian Open.
Rafael Nadal has been urged to call time on his career by Express Sport readers after his latest injury setback ruled him out of the Australian Open. The Spaniard made a brief return to the court at the Brisbane International earlier this month but suffered a small muscle tear against Jordan Thompson in the quarter-finals.
Nadal has barely played over the last 12 months and is expected to retire at the end of this year, with his constant injury problems threatening to derail his farewell campaign. It seems that many fans would not be too upset to see Nadal go now, rather than delaying his retirement for another few months in light of his fitness issues.
In our latest tennis poll, 57 per cent of voters said that Nadal should hang up his racket immediately and steer clear of making another comeback when his latest injury heals. He will be hoping to recover in time for the French Open, where he has won the majority of his Grand Slam titles, but there is no guarantee that he will be in a position to compete for the top prize.
Sixty seven per cent of voters said they do not expect Nadal to win this year’s French Open title, with just 33 per cent of Express Sport readers backing him to get the job done at Roland Garros. Novak Djokovic will almost certainly be the favourite even if Nadal manages to recover in time, with the Serb having looked almost unstoppable in the absence of his Spanish rival.
In terms of Nadal’s performance in Brisbane, 42 per cent of voters were pleasantly surprised and said that he was better than they were expecting him to be. Another 48 per cent of respondents said that Nadal met expectations but did not exceed them, while just 10 per cent thought that he did worse than anticipated.
It remains to be seen how Nadal will fare this year, with the 37-year-old needing to recover from his latest injury setback before worrying about anything else. Alex Corretja recently told Express Sport that he is expecting Nadal to get back on the court as soon as possible, given the extra motivation of playing at the French Open for what could be the final time.
“It’s obvious that on hard courts for the joints it’s a little bit risky because it’s a little bit harder,” said Corretja. “But as soon as he is ready to practice, we will see him. He will say again: ‘Okay, I’m getting back to practice’, and he will put a small goal to go.
“If he’s ready, maybe he’s ready to go to some of the South American tournaments on clay like Buenos Aires or so. But for that, he needs to be healthy. If he’s healthy, he would like to be on court as soon as possible. I don’t think he’s going to wait for the clay-court season because he’s been out for such a long time. I don’t think he can wait in his academy just practicing.”
