Nadal's Big Four secret: 'Ultimately, we always understood that this is just a game'

This is an anecdote with a backstory and a moral. The night on which Arsenal knocked out Real Madrid in the quarter-finals of the Champions League, with an aggregate score of 5-1, Andy Murray, a fan of the London outfit, picked up his phone and sent a message to Rafael Nadal. It had been some time since the two had been in touch.

“Hey Rafa, I haven’t spoken to you in a while,” wrote the Briton. “Just checking in to make sure you’re okay.”

Still disappointed by Real Madrid’s loss, Nadal took a few seconds to understand the true reason behind the message from the three-time Grand Slam champion.

“Then I realised it was one of his brilliant ideas, with his typical British sense of humour,” explained Nadal. “And it was brilliant. I was laughing to myself. It made me smile in a moment when I didn’t feel like smiling.”

^{Photo: Peter Staples/ATP Tour}
During the tribute Roland Garros held for the 14-time champion on Sunday on Court Philippe-Chatrier, Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic listened on as Nadal told his amusing story, while Murray stood with a sheepish smile. It was one of the most striking images of the evening. The four rivals, undoubtedly the biggest in the history of the game, laughed together on the clay of one of the courts that staged some of their biggest battles.

Their rivalry does not stretch beyond the bounds of the tennis court. It is a legacy that now sets an example for the generations to come.

“It was a way of understanding sport and life,” explained the Spaniard. “Ultimately, I think this is a positive message. We want to beat each other with all our might, but to reach that level of competition you don’t have to hate your rival,” he added. “That is the point. I don’t think you have to hate your rival in order to want to beat them with all your might. You can admire your rival and give them the utmost respect, and still want to beat them with all your might and do everything to achieve that. It is a legacy that goes beyond mere results.”

Djokovic, Nadal, Federer and Murray fought each other for the biggest titles on the ATP Tour in every corner of the planet for decades. The four players have 69 Grand Slam trophies between them, as well as countless other records they pushed each other to the limit for. However, they were always able to stay grounded, earning the Big Four a unique place in sporting history, and setting an example for a new generation of tennis players.

“I trust and I hope it is something that will help the new generations,” urged Nadal. “In today’s world, which is much more conflicted than most of us would like — also more radicalised in many ways — these positive messages of peace can be very good for a lot of people.

“We should feel proud of the way we carried ourselves in our careers from start to finish. We had our good and bad moments, and moments of lesser or greater rivalry. But ultimately we always understood that this is just a game. That’s not always easy, but I think we did it.”