Rafa Nadal has revealed he intentionally ignored requests from his wife and coaches to retire hurt during his shock loss to Mackenzie McDonald at the Australian Open on Wednesday. Nadal suffered a brutal straight-sets loss in what could be his final appearance at Melbourne Park after injuring his hip.
The 36-year-old was badly hobbled by the injury and could barely move around the court during the final stages of the match. However the Spanish champion refused to quit (he’s never retired hurt during a match in his entire career) and played on until McDonald sealed the victory.
Nadal’s wife Xisca was seen in tears in the crowd as the realisation set in that Nadal wasn’t going to be able to fight back. Speaking in his post-match press conference, Nadal said he intentionally stopped communicating with his team because he knew they were pleading with him to quit.
“Yeah, I consider all the time stopping, but I didn’t ask the physiotherapist at the end,” he said after the match. “I have to know myself. And I tried to keep playing without increasing the damage.
“No, that’s it. I was not able to hit the backhand at all. I was not able to run for the ball. But I just wanted to finish the match. That’s it.”
Nadal also defied the wishes of his team to retire hurt against Taylor Fritz at Wimbledon last year when he suffered an abdominal injury. On that occasion he managed to win the quarter-final clash before pulling out of his semi-final against Nick Kyrgios.
