Rafael Nadal appears to be seriously at risk of missing the French Open for the first time in his career. The Spaniard has long been dubbed the ‘King of Clay’ and is a 14-time champion at Roland Garros, only ever losing three matches. But after his latest injury update, Nadal could remain sidelined when his favourite tournament begins in less than six weeks’ time.
On Thursday, Nadal provided fans with his biggest update yet since getting injured at January’s Australian Open. The 36-year-old conceded that his current training programme hadn’t gone to plan, as he is now in week 14 of a six-to-eight-week recovery timeframe.
He has now stopped training to start a new treatment plan after initially being under “the illusion” that he would be able to play the full clay season. And with just 37 days to go until the French Open begins, Nadal is running out of time to first recover from his psoas injury before he begins training again.
If the world No 14 can’t recover in time, there is a chance that he will miss the French Open for the first time in his career. It would be a major loss for both Nadal and the tournament – as the most important event in his career while he is their 14-time champion with his own statue on the grounds.
Nadal has never withdrawn from the French Open ahead of the tournament. The 36-year-old has played the event a total of 18 times, starting when he won the trophy on his debut as a teenager back in 2005.
He has only ever lost a match on three occasions – in 2009 to Robin Soderling and in 2015 and 2021 to Novak Djokovic. And injury has only ruined his chances of competing once in 2016, when he withdrew ahead of his third-round match with an injury.
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