Nadal pull-out stuns French Open

Tennis - French Open - Roland Garros - Rafael Nadal of Spain vs Facundo Bagnis of Argentina. - Paris, France Nadal reacts after he won - REUTERS

Reuters: Rafael Nadal went down fighting on his favourite battleground a year ago but this time his quest for an unprecedented 10th French Open title ended sitting glumly in front of a microphone.

With third-round action in full swing out on the Roland Garros claycourts, Nadal dropped a bombshell midway though a sunny afternoon when he announced he was withdrawing because of an injury to his left wrist.

For one of the game’s fiercest fighters, it was a lame way to go - especially after he had dropped only nine games in reaching the third round where he had been due to play compatriot Marcel Granollers on Saturday.

The Spaniard’s hastily convened news conference which caught everyone on the hop cast a pall over the tournament, especially after 17-times grand slam champion and 2009 French winner Roger Federer withdrew last week due to a back injury.

Explaining the problem, he said an injury that first flared up in Madrid a few weeks ago had returned with a vengeance and that soldiering on could risk snapping a tendon.

“I’m here to announce that I have to retire from the tournament because I have a problem in my wrist that I have had a couple of weeks,” Nadal, 30 next week, told a room packed with nonplussed reporters.

“Yesterday evening I started to feel more and more pain and today I felt I could not move my wrist.

“To win the title I need five more matches. The doctor says that’s 100% impossible.”

Fourth seed Nadal, beaten only twice in 74 matches at the French Open since taking the place by storm in 2005, had looked primed to reclaim his throne after losing to Djokovic in last year’s quarter-finals when he was struggling for form.

That his attempt failed because of injury made it all the more disappointing.

“Nine times in my career I have been able to be healthy here and to win this tournament, now is a tough moment, but is not the end,” said Nadal, who pulled out of Wimbledon in 2009 and the London 2012 Olympics with well-chronicled knee injuries.

“Life goes on. The world isn’t going to stop,” he added.

Murray storms into French Open last eight

AFP: Second seed Andy Murray reached the French Open quarter-finals for the sixth time on Sunday with a 7-6 (11/9), 6-4, 6-3 win over John Isner of the United States.

Murray, a three-time semi-finalist in Paris, will face either Japan’s Kei Nishikori or Richard Gasquet, the last French player standing, in the last-eight.

It will be 29-year-old Murray’s 20th appearance in the quarter-finals of the last 21 majors after braving an Isner storm in the first set where he faced down three set points in the tie-breaker.

Wawrinka into last eight at French Open

AFP: Defending champion Stan Wawrinka reached the French Open quarter-finals on Sunday with a 7-6 (7/5), 6-7 (7/9), 6-3, 6-2 win over Victor Troicki of Serbia.

The third-seeded Swiss player will next go up against Spanish surprise Albert Ramos-Vinolas, who upset eighth seed Milos Raonic in straight sets, with a place in the semi-finals on the line.

Mirza-Hingis Slam dream ends in Paris

AFP: Top seeds Martina Hingis and Sania Mirza saw their hopes of holding all four Grand Slam women’s doubles titles at the same time come to a shattering end on Sunday.

Bidding to become the first team to hold all four majors simultaneously since Serena and Venus Williams in 2010, Hingis and Mirza slumped to a shock 6-3, 6-2 loss to Czech pair Barbora Krejcikova and Katerina Siniakova in the third round.