Nadal reflects on 'very positive week' in Brisbane, but waits on injury scare

Rafael Nadal's return at the Brisbane International presented by Evie ended with a quarter-final defeat to Jordan Thompson on Friday. Nadal missed out on three match points in the second set of an eventual 7-5, 6-7(6), 4-6 defeat, and he left the court for a medical timeout late in the final set for treatment on his upper left leg.

Though the Spaniard moved well in the final games of the match, including on a marathon match point for Thompson, he was unable to break the resistance of the home favourite down the stretch as he fell to 2-1 in the pair's Lexus ATP Head2Head series.

"I'm tired, or course, Sad in this moment because I had plenty of opportunities," Nadal said after exiting what was his first tournament since the 2023 Australian Open. "But I think he played a good match. For me, even [though] that was not the best match, I had a lot of opportunities to win it, so... That's it, I need to accept all this kind of stuff. After a year, that's normal that things happen.

"As I say every day: Every day is a different story, and things are difficult after such a long time. Today the opponent played well, made me play one more ball. I didn't play bad, but I was just one ball away."

While Nadal was happy with his effort on the week, a run that included straight-sets wins against Dominic Thiem and Jason Kubler, he was quick to point out the big picture of his comeback effort.

"It's a beginning. I didn't play a tournament for such a long time," he stressed. "Even without playing a tournament, it's not [like] I am practicing at the highest level for four months. As I said, the last month has been quite good in terms of intensity, but is not a long period of time."

Asked about the issue in his upper leg, Nadal explained that the problem is in a similar place to his injury from last season, but that the pain was more in his muscle as opposed to his tendon.

"For sure it's not the same like last year at all, because when it happened last year, I felt something drastic immediately," he said. "Today I didn't feel anything. The only problem is because the place is the same, you are a little bit more scared than usual.

"In ideal world, it's just the muscle supercharged after a few days of effort and a very tough match. That will be the ideal thing, something that we know that can happen today. That is why I'm talking all the time and my goal is to try to be competitive in a few months."

He also added: "If that [pain] is not important, it's a very positive week."