Rafael Nadal is still not 100% sure that he’ll play the Montreal Masters tournament, according to statements he made in an interview with Spanish television recently. He says his tendinitis plagued knees are feeling better, but maybe not good enough for the rigors of a hard court Masters event.
“I don’t know (if I’ll play). I would like to be in Montreal in a week and a half. I will have to push it in the next few days and see.” via Yahoo!Sports
Here are some more interesting quotes translated via RafaelNadal.com and SportsYa:
Nadal hopes he’s “all good”:
“Good, the truth is that I feel good. But also, I have to wait and see how I continue to recover because I’ve only been back training for a week and a half and you always feel a bit better initially. You start with lots of hope, but again, the real test would be to see how I go when I really push my knees and I think that is likely to happen in the upcoming days. So I hope it’s all good.”
The real story on the knee pain, and the disappearing knee-tape:
“What happened was that I was in a lot of pain for a while, when I came back from Miami and I was training in Manacor, I started to feel a strong pain, especially in my right knee. It was a different kind of pain [to what I’ve experienced before], so I took off the bandages in my knees. . .and everyone thought that it was because I felt great, but the problem was that it didn’t hurt below the knee anymore, now it hurt above the knee. And well, the bandages weren’t helping me at all and that’s when it all started to get worse, little by little.”
Rafa admits that “mistakes were made” (but who made them?):
“The best thing could have been to rest three weeks after the Rome Masters in order to be physically ok at the French Open. I didn’t do it and I went to Madrid. Every step I took was a mistake, although nobody told me I would have been okay for Paris if I had dodged Madrid. . .It was my mistake, for sure. I’m the one to blame for this. The thing is that I could never learnt when to stop to take a rest.”
(So is Rafa saying “Ef you, Uncle Toni!” or not?)
Scarier than a pissed off Toni: Nadal also says that he’s wearing a “magnetotherapy device” to bed, which makes it hard to sleep because it involves lots of wires wrapped around his legs. Yikes!
Sorry Nadal fans, this is about as specific as Rafa gets on his goals for the future:
“Being the no. 1 is not my goal. The only thing I want is to be fine, to be happy on the court and play tennis better and better everyday, although there are people who may find it hard to understand or believe it. My only concern is to have my knees healed.”
And for anyone who thinks that his problems are stictly mental (eh, Boris?) or aggravated by his parents’ separation, Rafa’s answer is simple: “My real problem is the knees.” (via Eurosport)
My verdict: I’m starting to think of Rafael Nadal’s knee injury a bit like Maria Sharapova’s shoulder. It’s not something that will heal quickly or all-at-once, it might need surgery, and everyone, including Nadal, is going to have to learn to be patient and live with uncertainty.
Vamos, Rafa! Just take your time, okay?
Nadal News has a video of his interview with the TVE network (in Spanish) – click here to check it out.
Loading ...Tags: Federer, knee injury, Montreal Masters, Nadal, rogers cup, Sharapova, tennis
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I miss seeing Nadal play and I hope he plays Montreal, but I also hope he only plays it if he’s feeling great. From these quotes, I have a good feeling about his mindset, I believe he will be careful and oly choose to play if he’s 100%. After all, now he knows how dangerous it can be to play when something is wrong: the good part about learning from experience is that now he knows how it feels, he doesn’t have to take anyone’s word for it. Now no one has to tell him “playing injured is not very smart”. He tried that and he knows how dangerous it can be.
Hi C.F. – yeah, he definitely seems good mentally. Again, it reminds me a little of Sharapova’s situation. After a while, she seemed to accept her layoff and even enjoy it a little bit. I think for a strong competitor to be taken out of “the zone” for a while could be a good thing for their longevity. Of course, let’s hope they both get back to top physical form.
The idea that he has been playing with excrutiating pain makes me want to hug him tight (and not in that pervy way I usually have).
I know! It sounds awful.
I mean the pain, I mean, not your non-pervy hug. I’m sure that would be wonderful
“Rafa admits that “mistakes were made” (but who made them?); (So is Rafa saying “Ef you, Uncle Toni!” or not?)”
He said that he is the one to blame for the mistakes in the bit you quoted. I didn’t get the impression from any translation I’ve read that he was placing the blame anywhere but squarely on his shoulders. He’s used to playing through pain and didn’t know when to stop even though this was a different pain.
I too worry that it’s a bit like Sharapova’s shoulder and difficult for him to tell when it’s fully healed. I also worry that he seems to be saying he fears that it will get aggravated again by a return to a regular playing schedule and the physical stress of actual matches. I have tickets to Montreal, so my heart is wanting him to play there…but my head is saying he needs to do what’s best for the long term.
Hi there, Miri!
Shoot! I’m sorry about Montreal. At least you’ll be in an awesome city amongst (almost) all the top tennis players in the world. . .and Rafa might still play.
I was joking a little with that Uncle Toni comment but am curious – what do you think he meant when he said “Every step I took was a mistake, although nobody told me I would have been okay for Paris if I had dodged Madrid.”?
To me this definitely sounds reproachful. Of course, I’m taking it out of context because I don’t speak Spanish. But like Maria’s shoulder, which I believe her own doctor didn’t diagnose correctly, I think Rafa’s team could have been a bit more proactive in finding out how bad his knees really were/are.
Teams share the glory when players do well and I think it’s fair for them to share the blame when bad mistakes are made – especially if what Rafa says is true and nobody spoke up about not playing.
That said, I’m a big fan of Uncle Toni and I sure hope Rafa keeps him in the players box for a long time to come!
i really really really hope he doesn’t get to Montreal… so Roger can increase even more his ATP points gap.
“Ef you Uncle Toni”. Lol I doubt Nadal would ever say that. But for sure, I think his scheduling, particularly in the clay court season was a huge factor in his injury. I feel bad for the tournament directors, If Nadal withdraws and Federer is still a big ?. Ouch.
i want to see Rafa back on the courts healthy and feisty as ever just so Fed can have another shot at kicking his !@## spanish ass.
“i want to see Rafa back on the courts healthy and feisty as ever”
Ditto! FeddyBear.
“so Fed can have another shot at kicking his !@## spanish ass.”
Oh, he can have yet another shot alright! Don’t you worry.
*****
FreakyFrites,
“Every step I took was a mistake, although nobody told me I would have been okay for Paris if I had dodged Madrid.”
I think what Rafa meant by that is that it wasn’t a given that skipping Madrid would’ve helped his case. That maybe he was already far gone, the damage done, and it wasn’t guaranteed that skipping Madrid would’ve helped. Of course, all of us Rafans wanted him to skip Madrid, it would’ve definitely been in his best interest (along with skipping Rotterdam, yes I know he promised them he’d be there, and Barcelona, yes I know that it’s his tennis club, and Davis Cup, yes I know how ADORES playing with his team.)Perhaps his injury needed even more time than what skipping Madrid would’ve given him.
At 23, Rafa has already proven that he is strong, both in spirit, heart, and mind. This is a mistake he made and it’s wonderful to see how he is handling the situation. He is owning up to his error, expressing his regret, and working extremely hard and finding a solution to right his wrong. What a champ <3 Making mistakes is part of the learning curve, it is apart of life. The best part is, he only has 23. I believe he can, and will, recover from this and come back stronger than ever!
Also, don't disrespect Uncle Toni FreakyFrites, or us Rafans just might have to bust out the cheese..we're talking blue cheese and cheddar!
Vamos Rafa! All of your fans love and miss you! Like many have said, take your sweet time, we can wait. Don't worry about our sanity, we'll keep each other out of the nut house with old interviews, matches, etc.
. Miri will play a big part in that when she's back from Montreal 
. Rafa, you just do what you need to do so that you can be healthy and happy. That's what's most important to us. Get well soon. -8-@
Hi Mim!
Thanks so much for your comments! I love getting the Rafanatics on the boards here at GTT. (And I am a Rafa fan, as I think any hard-core tennis fan should be!)
Maybe even more than Rafa, I love Uncle Toni. He’s a real character and a tennis genius – he deserves so much credit for helping Rafa! BUT! I don’t think it’s disrespectful to expect him to share some of the blame for Rafa’s scheduling errors. Yes, Rafa is a grown man and can make his own decisions, even if they’re bad ones. But U.T. is his coach. U.T. gets the (highly deserved) accolades, I think he’s man enough to share the criticism. Habits are learned young, and U.T. has been Rafa’s guide throughout his career.
Of course, if there is evidence that U.T. was on his own knees begging Rafa to go back to Manacor and leave Madrid to Fernando Verdasco and F-Lo, I’ll admire him even more!
But I agree, in the end, it doesn’t really matter why Rafa isn’t around. It just matters that he comes back fit and healthy.
Could it be that Rafa is bluffing???
Could be but imo it’s more of a mental strategy again.Whatever!He should play when he is ready period.No pussyfooting cause its getting a bit tiresome.
Another Rafa fanatic here. He sounded good in the interview. I believe him when he says he will return to competition when all is good. Don’t know if that is Montreal however. He sounds grounded again, focused on health, happiness and playing tennis when ready.
I think this could be a new chapter for Rafa – it will be interesting to see what kinds of changes he makes! Hope he’ll be back in Montreal. . .
Vamos Roger!
Listening to the Spanish interview I didn’t get at all the feeling Rafa was reproachful to Tio Toni. The way he expressed himself sounded more to me as ‘Even if I had skipped Madrid, nobody could have guaranteed I’d be well for RG’.
But I am not a mothertongue Spanish so the subtleties could escape me.
I do hope Rafa gets better soon and can play they way we all love and respect. I miss him and it really hurt me to see how ‘not him’ he was when he played RG.
Laura
Ah, that makes sense Laura, thanks so much! It’s always so hard to read the subtleties of the comments when your relying on translations.
I still stand by my statement that Team Rafa is as much a part of his scheduling mistakes as he is. AT this point it doesn’t really matter, except that I hope his team will encourage him to rest more in the future.
It’s great to hear Rafa is in control of his own destiny.