Rafael Nadal, seeded number two, made his debut on Tuesday at the grass-court tournament at Wimbledon beating the Argentine Francisco Cerúndolowho waged a battle starting a set against the Spanish in a difficult first match.
The king of clay, who had not played at Wimbledon since 2019, prevailed by 6-4, 6-3, 3-6 and 6-4 in three hours and 33 minutes of rocky confrontation on center court at the All England Club in London.
The Argentine debuted at Wimbledon 19 years after the Spanish had done it.
“Fran started playing very well and has been a great rival”, Nadal later acknowledged before an audience standing up to applaud the two players.
“Today has been a very important test for me”he added, grateful that this victory allows him to continue improving his game on the pitch.
“It’s not a surface we play on very often” and “In the last three years I had not stepped on the grass”, explained the number 4 in the world.
22 Grand Slam champion, Nadal, who has won the English tournament twice (2008 and 2010), had to find solutions to the fast drive and accurate of the Argentine, 23 years old and number 41 in the world, who was playing his first match at Wimbledon against a legend and on center court.
That didn’t stop him from raising some difficulties to the Spanish star, 36 years old and apparently without pain from a degenerative disease that he suffers from in his left foot.
Despite not shining especially with the serve, Cerúndolo recovered several breaks of his service and maintained long exchanges pushing Nadal into error, who once slipped and fell to the grass.
The Argentine, who reached the semifinals in Miami, was especially intractable in the third set and broke his opponent’s serve again at the beginning of the fourth.
But he ended up succumbing to the speed and aggressiveness of the Spaniard, who after winning the Australian Open and Roland Garros, is halfway in his ambition to add four Grand Slam in a year.
Rafael Nadal, seeded number two, made his debut on Tuesday at the grass-court tournament at Wimbledon beating the Argentine Francisco Cerúndolowho waged a battle starting a set against the Spanish in a difficult first match.
The king of clay, who had not played at Wimbledon since 2019, prevailed by 6-4, 6-3, 3-6 and 6-4 in three hours and 33 minutes of rocky confrontation on center court at the All England Club in London.
The Argentine debuted at Wimbledon 19 years after the Spanish had done it.
“Fran started playing very well and has been a great rival”, Nadal later acknowledged before an audience standing up to applaud the two players.
“Today has been a very important test for me”he added, grateful that this victory allows him to continue improving his game on the pitch.
“It’s not a surface we play on very often” and “In the last three years I had not stepped on the grass”, explained the number 4 in the world.
22 Grand Slam champion, Nadal, who has won the English tournament twice (2008 and 2010), had to find solutions to the fast drive and accurate of the Argentine, 23 years old and number 41 in the world, who was playing his first match at Wimbledon against a legend and on center court.
That didn’t stop him from raising some difficulties to the Spanish star, 36 years old and apparently without pain from a degenerative disease that he suffers from in his left foot.
Despite not shining especially with the serve, Cerúndolo recovered several breaks of his service and maintained long exchanges pushing Nadal into error, who once slipped and fell to the grass.
The Argentine, who reached the semifinals in Miami, was especially intractable in the third set and broke his opponent’s serve again at the beginning of the fourth.
But he ended up succumbing to the speed and aggressiveness of the Spaniard, who after winning the Australian Open and Roland Garros, is halfway in his ambition to add four Grand Slam in a year.
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