Nadal suffers defeat at French Open

Nafael Nadal lost in the first round of the French Open to Alexander Zverev 6-3, 7-6 (5), 6-3 on Monday in what might turn out to be the 14-time Roland Garros champion’s last match at his favorite tournament. Nadal has indicated 2024 likely would be his last season before retirement, but he said Saturday that he is not 100% sure he won’t play again at the French Open. And he reiterated that after Monday’s defeat, only his fourth in 116 career matches at the place. Never far from physical issues in his glittering career, the 37-year-old missed almost all of 2023 with a hip problem and his comeback earlier this year was stalled by a muscle tear, before small niggles affected his preparation for the claycourt major. Nadal crashed to a 6-3 7-6(5) 6-3 defeat by fourth seed Alexander Zverev in Paris and although there were positives, he said he could not predict how his battered body would respond to the demands of the Games in July and August. Nadal will be eyeing his third gold medal after triumphing in singles in the 2008 Beijing Games and doubles eight years later in Rio. He had expressed doubts about his fitness ahead of what is likely his final French Open. “Today in the match, I felt I was able to move myself much better than in the previous tournaments. But I had a very tough opponent in front of me. He played well,” Nadal added. “It looks difficult, honestly. For me now I can’t confirm what’s going on, but it looks difficult to make a transition to grass, having the Olympics again on clay,” Nadal said. “I need to talk with the team. I need to analyse so many facts. But I don’t think it’s going to be smart after all the things that happened to my body to make a big transition to a completely different surface and then come back to clay.