Rafael Nadal claims to have struggled with injury during the match against Mackenzie McDonald as he crashed out of the grand slam tournament.
Australian Open defending champion Rafael Nadal stated that he struggled with hip injury during the match that made him crashed out of the tournament against Mackenzie McDonald.
The Spaniard had pulled up in pain when chasing a ball at the back of the court. He winced in agony and promptly dropped to his knees after appearing to injure his hip. It looked like he was finished.
McDonald came out on top in the match, securing the match 6-4, 6-4, 7-5. The reigning men’s champion had been knocked out of the draw, but his fight and determination endeared himself to all.
“To be the defending champion here, I didn’t want to leave the court with a retirement,” Nadal later said. “I tried until the end. I was not able to hit the backhand at all. I was not able to run for the ball. [Winning] was not possible, but I just wanted to finish the match.
“Try your best to the end. That’s the philosophy of the sport. I tried to follow that during my tennis career.”
Nadal will undergo scans in the coming days to determine the extent of his injury before committing to any upcoming tournaments.
“I have history in the hip, [but] I don’t know if it’s a muscle, if it’s the joint, if it’s the cartilage,” he said. “Hopefully it’s nothing too bad. I really hope that it doesn’t put me out of the court for a long time, because then it’s tough to make all the recovery again. I went through this process too many times in my career. It’s not only the recovery, it’s all the amount of work that you need to put together to come back at a decent level.”
