Rafael Nadal revealed that he is reconsidering his previous plan to retire at the end of this season, having cancelled a planned tribute ceremony at the French Open. The 38-year-old has struggled with injuries in the past few years and has decided to skip Wimbledon to avoid changing surfaces between Roland Garros and the Olympics.
French Open tournament director Amelie Mauresmo had previously arranged a special ceremony to honour Nadal, a 14-time winner of the Grand Slam, ahead of his first-round clash with Alexander Zverev.
Nadal, however, did not want any such treatment in a hint that he could well return in 2025. He originally green-lit the efforts made in Paris to potentially bid farewell to the Major’s greatest-ever player, before making a sharp U-turn.
“At first, I said, ‘OK, let’s go!’ But at the last minute I said I didn’t want it, that’s the truth,” Nadal told L’Equipe. “It would have bothered me to announce that it was the last time I was playing the tournament, knowing that I did not have the opportunity to prepare as I would have liked.
“And nothing prevents them from waiting a year. If the tribute takes place and I am retired, I will go there as a retiree. And if I still play, I will obviously be present. I preferred not to live with the idea that they had to pay tribute to me, because it was practically forcing me not to play here again and I was not ready at that time.”
Having announced that he would not be playing on the Wimbledon grass in order to prepare for this summer’s Paris Olympics, fans at SW19 will have feared that they may have seen the last of the two-time champion.
But an overjoyed Nadal, enjoying his tennis once again after lengthy battles with injuries, hinted that he may go back on previous plans to quit tennis in 2024.
“I feel like I’m finding the pleasure of playing again, having fun,” he explained. “I want to give myself a chance to see if my physique remains at this level or if it is only a temporary moment and that it starts to go wrong again. I give myself time to see how I will feel after the Olympic Games and then we will see what will happen, what decisions I will make.”
Should Nadal continue to get joy out of playing tennis then there is a chance that he could still make another appearance at Wimbledon next year. The 2024 edition of SW19 is the first since 1998 without all three of Nadal, Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, but perhaps as many as two could feature in 12 months’ time.
