Rafael Nadal admits he can no longer give 100% every day on the Tour after producing a dream start to his campaign at the Madrid Masters. 

The 22-time Grand Slam champion stormed to a 6-1, 6-0, win over wild card Darwin Blanch who was making his debut at the age of 16. Nadal’s one-sided encounter saw the Spaniard hit nine winners as he capitalised on a costly 27 unforced errors produced by his opponent. On paper, it appears that the former world No.1 is getting back to full form. However, the reality is not quite the same. 

“I have been able to play a match against a player with a huge potential but he is still very young and still making mistakes,” Nadal said afterwards. 
“I didn’t test much my body today. I think I played a decent match doing the things that I had to do to be through, but at the same time, I played against a player that today was not solid enough yet because he was making more mistakes.
“Probably the scenario, all the situation that he went through to play this kind of match didn’t help him.”

Rising star Blanch is a top 10 junior but is yet to break into the top 1000 on the professional circuit. He is managed by IMG who also owns the Madrid Open. Explaining how he managed to obtain a wild card for the tournament, as well as the Miami Open earlier this year. 

Whilst there is a significant difference in experience between Nadal and the American, a win is still a boost for the 37-year-old who is likely to be playing his last ATP event on home soil this week. No retirement date has been set with the Spaniard yet to come to a decision. However, he admits his history of battles with injury is taking its toll on him.

“I try to play at my 100%, but I can’t give my 100% every day.” He said.
“The thing is before, most of the time, I was able to give my 100% of the 100%. Today I’m able to give my 100% of sometimes 40%, sometimes 60%, sometimes 70%, and if I am able to raise this percentage day after day or week after week, why not see in the future what can happen? If not, it’s impossible and doesn’t make sense.”

The admission is made even more sombre with the tennis star saying his goal of playing tennis long enough for his son to remember watching him play may not happen. His wife Maria gave birth to their first child in October 2022.

“I would love to play a little bit longer and give him a memory of myself playing tennis. That’s what will be the ideal thing for me and my wife and family.” Nadal reflected.
“But I will not probably be able to make that happen. I’m happy to have a great team, family and friends around me during all my life that helped me in every single way of being happy.”

Next up for Nadal in Madrid will be a showdown with Alex de Minaur who beat him in Barcelona last week. Should he win, it would be the first top 20 player he has defeated since the 2022 ATP Finals. 

Naomi Osaka might have had limited success on the clay so far in her career but it isn’t stopping the former world No.1 from setting out big goals. 

The four-time Grand Slam winner recorded her first win on the surface in two years at the Madrid Open on Wednesday where she beat Greet Minnen 6-4, 6-1, in the first round. Osaka didn’t play any tournaments on clay last season after taking time away from the Tour to give birth to her first child. 

Since returning to the Tour in January, the 26-year-old has won eight out of 15 matches played with her best result being a run to the quarter-finals in Doha. However, Osaka is confident that she is heading in the right direction. 

“I slid a couple of times to my forehand pretty well, so I was excited about that,” she told reporters after beating Minnen. “She was hitting really good drop shots, but I think I got to a couple quite well. Movement-wise I’m feeling a lot more comfortable.”

Despite her various successes, Osaka has yet to reach a WTA final on the clay and at the French Open she has never got past the third round. The last time she reached a semi-final of the surface was back in 2019 at the Stuttgart Open. 

“I want to adapt and I’m trying to, but there are things that work for me and have gotten me to where I am, so I don’t want to start slicing and dicing,” she continued.
“There’s a basis to my game and I want to stick to that, but also respect the court. It’s a work in progress for me, but I’m watching a lot more matches on clay. I’m trying to do my homework as best as I can.”

This year Osaka has an extra incentive to focus on her clay game with this year’s Olympic Games taking place at the same venue as the French Open. She has described the four-year event as a ‘big goal’ of hers. 

She has beaten two top 20 players so far this season with one of those being Liudmila Samsonova who she will play again in the second round in Madrid. Although she is hungry for more.

“I would like to win a tournament on clay, I would think it’s very ironic but also hilarious if my first tournament (win back from maternity leave) would be clay,” Osaka commented. 
“For me, every tournament I play I want to win. I know that results so far haven’t shown that but I really think that something’s going to click eventually and when it does, I think I’ll be really good.
“But for right now, I’m just going to be as humble as I can. I’m happy to be in this tournament, I’m happy to be playing against the best players in the world and I learn from them every day.”

This year is Osaka’s sixth appearance in Madrid. Her best result was reaching the quarter-finals in 2019. 

Emma Raducanu showed a lack of willingness during her first round match at the Madrid Open, according to the head of her country’s Billie Jean King Cup team. 

The former US Open champion suffered a comprehensive 6-2, 6-2, defeat to world No.82 María Lourdes Carlé. The loss is Raducanu’s heaviest of the season so far in terms of games won. In the first set alone, the Brit hit just two winners compared to 19 unforced errors. Overall, she won only 14% (2/14) of her second service points and 46% (12/26) of her first. 

Reflecting on her performance afterwards, Raducanu admitted that she was feeling the effects of what has been a busy past couple of weeks. She helped her country beat France in the Billie Jean King Cup where she defeated Carolina Garcia. Then last week in Stuttgart she recorded two impressive victories over Angelique Kerber and Linda Noskova before losing in the quarter-finals to world No.1 Iga Swiatek. 

“The last few weeks have been a lot. Starting from the Billie Jean King Cup, I haven’t stopped.” Said Raducanu, who was in Madrid without her coach Nick Cavaday.
“It’s just been back-to-back and I was very happy being able to help carry the team in the BJK Cup, then straight to Stuttgart with no rest, then straight here and trying to adapt to the conditions which are very different because it’s outdoors and I was playing indoors for the last month. Many factors have made it very difficult to fully compete today but overall I’ve been playing pretty well.”

Despite Raducanu’s upbeat outlook, others have taken a dimmer view towards her latest result with BJK captain Anne Keothavong saying she ‘made a meal of the match.‘ Speaking on Sky Sports, Keothavong questioned if it was the right decision for her compatriot to play in Madrid after she appeared to show a lack of commitment to playing. 

“She touched on the fact, ‘Yes, I’m tired,’ The Times quoted Keothavong as saying. “She acknowledged that in her interview yesterday (Tuesday), but now when I look back, do you talk yourself into more tiredness? On one hand, it’s good to acknowledge it but on the other hand, if you’re going to go out there on the match court, you’ve got to be prepared to leave it all out there. That willingness just didn’t seem evident.
“Should she have taken the wild card this week? When the wild card is there, it’s a big event and for most players you are going to say, ‘Thank you very much, that’s a great opportunity.’ It’s a WTA 1000 and potentially big points on the board that will move her ranking from where it is at the moment [No 221].
“But when you see a player perform like that, you kind of question, ‘OK, maybe physically I wasn’t ready for it, mentally I wasn’t engaged and actually I probably could have done with the week off.’ Maybe in hindsight it would have been better to take this week off and go to play qualifying in Rome [the Italian Open starts next week].”

It is yet to be confirmed where Raducanu will be playing next. The Italian Open will get underway on May 7th but she will have to enter the qualifying draw with the use of her protected ranking unless organisers give her a wild card.

Heading into the second round of the Madrid Open, there is only one British woman left in the draw which is Katie Boulter who received a bye in the first round and will start against Robin Montgomery. In the men’s draw, Jack Draper and Cameron Norrie are still playing.