The Spaniard suffered a rare defeat in the quarterfinals of the Monte Carlo Masters
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The tennis world was in shock to learn that the clay court specialist, Rafael Nadal, got knocked out of the Monte Carlo Masters in the quarterfinals. The 13-time French Open champion suffered a shock defeat to Andrey Rublev 6-2, 4-6, 6-2. Nadal admitted to having made “lots of mistakes” in the surprise loss. “But that’s it… It’s not the moment to complain. When you’re not able to do the things you had to do on court, then it’s not the moment to complain after,” said Nadal.
It is back to practice courts for Nadal, who looks to overcome the issues he faced in the match. “The only thing that I can do is go to Barcelona and keep practising, try to fix the things that didn’t work well. Lots of mistakes… A few things that make a big difference on the result and on my game that I wasn’t able to make today.”
What was even more interesting was the lack of precision in Nadal’s serves. The Spaniard made seven double faults and was also broken seven times. “For some reason I had problems with my serve,” said Nadal, who won just 42 per cent of his second service points.”
RUBLEV HAS DONE IT! ?@AndreyRublev97 defeats Nadal 6-2, 4-6, 6-2 in an instant classic.#RolexMCMasters pic.twitter.com/NhUZhpzQve
— ATP Tour (@atptour) April 16, 2021
“I don’t understand why, because I was not having problems in the practices at all. But today, was one of those days that my serve was a disaster. Serving like this, the serve creates an impact on the rest of the game,” he added.
“When you serve with no confidence, you are just focusing on trying to serve, not thinking about how you want to [hit] the ball. You just think about what you have to do with the serve to put the ball in.”
Rafa also had kind words for his opponent Rublev, saying he deserved it more. “He played well and he deserved [it] more than me,” said Nadal. “I fought. That’s the positive thing, I was there.”
“But you can’t expect [to] win against a player like him losing my serve… too many [times]… He played great. He played aggressive, as I knew [he would]. Well done to him. He’s a great guy. [I] wish him all the best,” added Nadal.
