WIMBLEDON, England — Rafael Nadal, the 22-time Grand Slam champion, has withdrawn from his semifinal match against Nick Kyrgios, set for Friday.
“I believe I cannot win two games under these circumstances,” he said. “I cannot serve.”
Nadal made the announcement at a press conference shortly after 2:00 PM Eastern in the main media conference room at the All England Club, explaining that he was withdrawing due to a torn abdominal muscle.
“I’ve been thinking about the decision all day,” he said. “I don’t think there’s any point in going.”
“I’m very sad,” he said.
Nadal, who entered the tournament halfway to a Grand Slam and with concerns about his chronically injured foot, said he started feeling pain in his abdomen about a week ago. The pain worsened and it became clear he most likely tore the muscle early in his five-set win over Taylor Fritz in the quarterfinals on Wednesday.
In that match, Nadal took a medical break in the second set. From the stands, his father and other family members motioned for him to stop playing rather than risk further injury, but Nadal ignored their pleas and produced one of the most remarkable comeback victories of a career that has seen many of them.
After the match, Nadal warned that he might not be able to play in the semifinals and that he planned to have a scan to determine the extent of the injury.
“The decision at the end – all decisions – is the player’s decision, but at the same time I have to know different opinions and I have to check everything in the right way, right? It’s even more important than winning Wimbledon, it’s health,” he said. Still, few thought Nadal, who has played through pain for much of his career, wouldn’t at least attempt to play in the semifinals.
The exit — the first from a Wimbledon semifinal in the modern era of tennis — was particularly disappointing because Nadal’s game has been improving with each match, something he noted on Thursday and after his win over Fritz, despite it being his first grass-court tournament from three years.
“I’m in the semi-finals so I’ve been playing really well the last couple of days, especially yesterday, at the start of the match, I’m playing at a very, very high level,” he said.
With Nadal’s withdrawal, Kyrgios gets a bye into his first Grand Slam singles final. Kyrgios, 27, has never reached a Grand Slam singles semifinal during a career full of controversy.
“Different players, different personalities,” Kyrgios wrote of Nadal in an Instagram post after the announcement. “@rafaelnadal hope your recovery is going well and we all hope to see you well soon 🗣🙏🏽 until next time.”
Nadal won the first two Grand Slams of the year, the Australian Open and the French Open. The win against Fritz moved him to just nine Grand Slam wins in a calendar year, something no male player has accomplished since Rod Laver in 1969.
The withdrawal is the latest blow for a tournament that has followed a rocky road since April, when organizers announced they would ban Russian and Belarusian players from competing because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Organizers made the move amid intense pressure from the British government and the royal family, which is closely linked to the tournament and did not want Kate, Duchess of Cambridge, to be photographed carrying out her traditional duty of presenting a trophy to a Russian or Belarusian champion .
No tournament outside Great Britain, including the US Open, followed Wimbledon’s lead. The decision also sparked a battle with the men’s and women’s professional tournaments, which decided not to award ranking points for wins at Wimbledon, turning the sport’s most prestigious tournament into something of an exhibition.
The situation became more awkward on Thursday when Elena Rybakina, who was born and raised in Russia but began representing Kazakhstan four years ago after her tennis federation offered to fund her development, advanced to the women’s final.
On Thursday night, however, everything else paled in comparison to the disappointment that Nadal would not be able to take the court for his clash with Kyrgios and, had he prevailed, a possible 60th match against Novak Djokovic.
Nadal said the injury caused discomfort for several days, but the pain became severe in the fifth game of the match as he led 3-1. It got even worse two games later when Fritz broke Nadal’s serve to take the lead.
Nadal said he then changed the way he served, slowing down and shifting what would normally be a high twisting motion — the torque of his torso and the power of his legs — to serve at roughly 120 miles per hour. During long stretches of the match, Nadal struggled to serve in triple figures.
Still, he resisted his family’s pleas to quit, wanting to finish what he started. He defended that decision on Thursday, even though it ultimately cost the tournament one of its semifinals.
He called it the right decision “because I won the match. I finished the game. I won the match. I was doing the things I felt at any given moment.”
However, his willingness to risk his health changed Thursday, he said, when he saw and felt the extent of the tear. He reasoned that it would be impossible to win two more games and that the attempt would only aggravate the injury and cause him to miss more games this summer.
“Very difficult circumstances,” he said, pursing his lips with that slight tilt of his head that he so often does when delivering unpleasant news.
He said he won’t be able to compete for at least three or four weeks, but will be able to start hitting from the baseline in just one week, then start serving once he can do so without discomfort. This is important for Nadal, as his chronically injured foot often becomes a problem when he is not playing for long periods of time. He can start serving sometime after that, assuming he can play without pain.
That schedule, he said, won’t interfere with his normal summer schedule, which typically includes hard-court tournaments in Canada and Cincinnati before the US Open begins in late August.
As of now, Djokovic will not be able to play at the US Open due to his refusal to get vaccinated against Covid-19. Currently, US policy prohibits unvaccinated foreigners from entering the country.
In recent years, Djokovic has been obsessed with ending his career with the most Grand Slam singles titles. He started the year tied with Nadal and Roger Federer at 20.
Nadal then won the first two Grand Slams of the year to move forward in a race he said he didn’t care much about, something that was a little hard to understand given how competitive he is on court .
“As always, the most important thing is happiness more than any title, even if everyone knows how much effort I put in to be here,” he said.
He also said on Thursday night that he had never considered the withdrawal that would end his chance at a calendar-year Grand Slam, a pursuit that Djokovic is also obsessed with and came within one match of elimination last year when Nadal missed the second half of the year with a sore foot.
“I never thought about the calendar bump,” he said. “I was thinking about my daily happiness.”
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