By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña
Rafael Nadal’s hunt for a 23rd Grand Slam championship title has come to an end after pulling out of the 2022 Wimbledon semifinals due to an abdominal strain injury.
Moments after his huge five-set win against American Taylor Fritz during the quarterfinals, the legendary Spaniard addressed his intent to withdraw from his match against Nick Kyrgios in the semifinals.
Nadal suffered the unfortunate injury during the quarterfinals and had to request a medical timeout to receive treatment in his abdomen.
Despite the injury, Nadal courageously finished the grueling five-setter and would end up winning the match against Fritz.
“As everybody saw yesterday in the quarterfinal, I have been suffering with abdominal pain. I knew something was not okay there. Yeah, that’s confirmed. I have a tear in the muscle in the abdomen. I was thinking during the whole day about the decision to make,” said Nadal.
Upon entering the 2022 Wimbledon tournament, Nadal is also seeking a Grand Slam hat-trick after raising the championship trophies during the Australian Open and the French Open several months ago.
Nadal will have the chance to bounce back from an injury-plagued Wimbledon run when he returns to the court in the last Grand Slam tournament of the year, the US Open.
With his recent tournament move, his rival, the flamboyant Kyrgios from Australia will be punching the first ticket to the Wimbledon men’s grand finals stage.
“Even if I tried a lot of times during my career to keep going under very tough circumstances, in that one I think it’s obvious that if I keep going the injury is going to be worse and worse. I feel very sad to say that,” added Nadal.
