Rafael Nadal has cast doubt over his own fitness ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympics. The Spanish icon has already been selected to represent his country at Roland Garros, and as well as playing in the singles will team up in the doubles with Carlos Alcaraz.
But he will head to the Games without a tournament win since the 2022 French Open, which signified his 22nd Grand Slam title.
On Sunday, Nadal was comfortably beaten 6-3 6-2 by Nuno Borges in the final of the Bastad Open in Sweden.
Having come through gruelling three-set battles with Mariano Navone and Duje Ajdukovic to make the final, the 38-year-old was notably below his best against the world No.42. And afterwards, he admitted that playing five matches in a week had left him fatigued and struggling physically.
The level was so far from what it should be. Probably the energy too,” said Nadal. “It has been a long week with long matches. Even if my body, I don’t have damage, that’s important — but mentally and physically, I am not used to playing four days in a row and playing long matches.”
The ‘King of Clay’ will be at his favoured venue for the summer games, having claimed 14 of his Slam titles at Roland Garros. He even withdrew from Wimbledon the year to focus instead on his Olympic preparations, but crashed out at the first hurdle in the French Open with a straight-sets loss to Alexander Zverev.
However, despite his concerns, Nadal also reflected positively on making a final in Sweden. Even if he acknowledged that his performance levels fell way below his expectations.
“I played the final, that’s positive,” he said. “I was able to play long matches without having an injury, that’s good. In some way I felt that I arrived here practising much better than what I played on the tournament during the whole week.
That’s something that I am not satisfied with. I arrived here with the feeling that I was playing a good level and I was not able to show that during the whole week.
Anyway it’s a final, so I can’t say it’s a bad result because it’s the first final since a long time ago. But I was not able to feel myself comfortable enough during the whole week to be satisfied with the week of tennis that I played.”
Nadal currently has two Olympic gold medals to his name, having first triumphed in Beijing in 2008. Eight years on from beating Fernando Gonzalez in the final, he and compatriot Marc Lopez won the doubles crown in Rio.
