Rafael Nadal stated he was “speaking from the heart” when asked if he would be ready to compete against Jiri Lehecka at the Madrid Open. On Monday, the 37-year-old overcame Pedro Cachin after spending more than three hours on the court. For the first time this fortnight, he will not have a day off before his next game.
Nadal required three hours and four minutes to defeat Cachin 6-1 6-7(5) 6-3 in his seventh encounter of the season. It was one of the most difficult tests of his recovery thus far, and only the second three-setter he has played since returning from a year-long injury layoff, injuring himself during his loss against Jordan Thompson in Brisbane.
Following that match, the former world number one discovered he had suffered a minor muscle rupture, forcing him to miss three more months of competition. And Nadal is now waiting to see how he feels when he wakes up on Tuesday, when he will face 30th seed Lehecka in the final match of the day in Madrid.
When asked if he was concerned about playing for two days in a row, the five-time Madrid Open champion replied, “That’s tennis. I mean, I can’t be concerned about playing again tomorrow. “That is how the tournament works.”
“I need to find a way to play multiple days in a row while remaining competitive. I am not sure if I am in that moment yet. Let’s see what happens tomorrow. But I’m going to try. I’m going to do everything the right way to be prepared for tomorrow. So I am not concerned at all. Just pleased to be back on the court tomorrow, hopefully. “I hope to be ready.”
Nadal is cautiously optimistic after three hours on court. Referring back to his encounter against Thompson, the Spaniard highlighted why he needed to be realistic about his body’s ability to stand up. “It’s positive, because as I said in Spanish, now I don’t feel that something went wrong on my body, but I need to wait until tomorrow, being 100 per cent honest,” he remarked when asked about playing a match for so long.
“In Brisbane, after the match with Jordan Thompson, I felt something, but I hoped in the press conference that nothing bad had happened, but it did, you know. Then, when I woke up the next day, my feelings were not what I had expected. So I had to go through the entire process, including the MRI, which revealed I had a tiny tear there.”
However, the 22-time Grand Slam champion believes that this time is different, albeit he does not want to preemptively declare that he will be ready for his next encounter. “I don’t have that negative feeling now like I had in that moment, but nobody knows what can happen during the night and how I wake up tomorrow morning,” he said.
“Isn’t that true? I’m not saying that just to protect myself. I am speaking from my heart, expressing exactly how I feel right now. Let’s wait until tomorrow. I hope nothing happens, and I hope to be on the court tomorrow.”
If Nadal does on the court against Lehecka, he does not consider himself the favourite, especially after his battle against Cachin. “I’ll be playing against a really high-level guy who has a tremendous serve and strikes from outside the court. Alex [De Minaur, world No. 11, whom he defeated last round] may be ranked higher than Lehecka, but his ball quality is on another level, so we’ll see,” he continued.
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