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Rafael Nadal, the world’s fourth-largest player on Tuesday, said he had withdrawn from the ongoing Masters 1000 Hard Court event in Toronto due to persistent pain in his left leg injured.
Due to injury, the 20-time Grand Slam champion was unable to compete in this year’s Wimbledon and Tokyo Olympics, helping to leave the shocking third round at the Washington Open last week.
“As people know, I’ve been having this problem for months,” said Nadal, the five-time winner of the event canceled last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Of course, I’m not happy that I couldn’t play this year after I missed a year after I succeeded here in Canada.”
He said the decision was difficult, but added that the most important thing was to be better able to return to appreciating the time in court.
“Today, with this pain I can’t enjoy it, and I really don’t believe I have the opportunity to fight for what I need to fight,” he said.
Nadal says he has been working on a recurrent foot problem since 2005. The issue has returned at the French Open this year and has decided to participate in two of the biggest events of the year after falling to final champion Novak Djokovic in the semifinals.
Nadal is now paying attention to getting in shape ahead of the US Open in New York.
“I really wanted to play a lot here, but now is the moment to make a decision. Unfortunately, this is the decision I made and I’ll probably know more in the next few days,” he said. Said.
The second seed Nadal will be replaced by Lucky Loser and fellow Spanish Feliciano Lopez in the main draw.
Rory Carroll
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