ROME
\nSpanish tennis legend Rafael Nadal said on Wednesday he was \u201cexcited to be playing in Rome\u201d despite entering the Italian Open unseeded and ranked 305.
\n\u201cAll the matches are tough for me today, difficult and more unpredictable than what they used to be for me, especially on clay,\u201d the 37-year-old, 10-time Italian Open winner said.
\n\u201cI accept that role. I accept that challenge. I\u2019m excited about the way that I can be able to play if I keep working the proper way and my body allows me.\u201d
\nThe 22-time Grand Slam singles champion has recently returned to the circuit after a long absence due to injury.
\nHe will open his campaign against Belgian qualifier Zizou Bergs with the Spanish icon taking nothing for granted but confident of his current match preparation.
\n\u201cI\u2019m excited to be playing in Rome. It\u2019s a tournament that brings back a lot of unforgettable memories,\u201d said Nadal, who turns 38 on June 3.
\n\u201cBut it\u2019s day by day. This will be my third week almost in a row on the tour, third tournament almost in a row.
\n\u201cThat hasn\u2019t happened for a super long time \u2014 that\u2019s good news.
\n\u201cI need to keep going. I need to keep exploring how I will be able to manage to play every day.
\n\u201cBut I\u2019m happy the way that I feel today.\u201d
\nNadal is not the only top player with injury issues. Young stars Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz are missing Rome.
\n\u201cWhen you push your body to the limit, you get injured,\u201d said Nadal.
\n\u201cWhen the game is faster and faster and faster, you get injured.
\n\u201cWhen you play most of the year on hard courts and the surfaces are tougher for the body, you get injured. That\u2019s the simple answer.\u201d
\nBut he said that such issues were inevitable.
\n\u201cIt is also about the tournaments, about the business, about the sport.\u201d
\n\u201cAt the end the players want to make money. The tournaments want to make money. The cycles come together.
\n\u201cWe accept that role. Things happen.\u201d
\n\u201cYou cannot complain about that. You accept what\u2019s going on. You keep going. You get injured, you have to recover well.
\n\u201cThey are young (Alcaraz and Sinner), they are going to have plenty of time to play in Rome and have a lot of success here. No drama.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ROME Spanish tennis legend Rafael Nadal said on Wednesday he was \u201cexcited to be playing in Rome\u201d despite entering the Italian Open unseeded and ranked 305. \u201cAll the matches are tough for me today, difficult and more unpredictable than what they used to be for me, especially on clay,\u201d the 37-year-old, 10-time Italian Open winner …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":64532,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64522"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64522\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":64535,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64522\/revisions\/64535"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}