Rafa Nadal avoids a first scare on his return to Wimbledon

MADRID, 28 Jun. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Spanish tennis player Rafa Nadal made his debut this Tuesday at Wimbledon, the third 'Grand Slam' of the season, with a hard-fought victory against the Argentine Francisco Cerúndolo, against whom he needed four sets (6-4, 6-3, 3-6, 6-4), in a match where he still noticed a certain lack of adaptation to a surface on which he has barely played and in which he was close to going to a fifth set.

The winner of 22 'greats' returned to the Central of the All England Tennis Club in what was his first match on the London grass since 2019 and the first official also in the last three years since the Swiss Roger Federer closed the pass to the final, and needed more than three and a half hours to meet the Lithuanian Ricardas Berankis in the second round.

With only the exhibitions in Hurlingham against Stan Wawrinka and Felix Auger-Aliassime as preparation, the Balearic did not finish carbureting, but he had experience to pass the first exam in search of raising his level and his foot did not seem to reduce his mobility, although he will need to refine his baseline shots more after accumulating 41 unforced errors, missing above all his usually powerful 'drive' and greater solidity with the serve (18 'break' balls conceded).

Cerúndolo, 41 in the world and not a specialist on this surface either, played his weapons in his third game in a 'big', but he did not know how to take advantage of his options to have put more pressure on the champion in Melbourne and Paris, an expert in getting out of situations more complicated than he experienced in the first and fourth sets, which at times seemed to be closer to his rival, who forgave too much and ended up paying for it.

Nadal was already in trouble in the first set. There he began dominating and came to have a 'break' advantage, but then lost. Later, he had to face a delicate situation when at 4-4 it was 15-40, at which point his serve and his temper worked perfectly to avoid a scare. Cerúndolo regretted not closing that door because the Spaniard then broke him to get ahead.

That blow did not affect the Argentine, who, supported by a great 'drive', continued to give 'war' to the double champion at Wimbledon, although he was again penalized after not taking advantage of his break option. Nadal did not forgive his in the next game after raising a 40-15 and took an advantage that he did not let go to go two sets to love up and close to the second round.

And a new quick 'break' at the beginning of the third set seemed like it would put an end to the excitement in Central. However, the man from Manacor was not successful this time and quickly lost that advantage, which ended up unleashing Cerúndolo's confidence. This broke in the eighth game to get 5-3 and serve, and despite the fact that the Spaniard saved two set points and had two other break points, the sleeve finally rewarded the faith of the Argentine.

This grew and became the dominator of the crash. The Balearic did not find his best game and the game continued to get uphill. Cerúndolo was doing a lot of damage and the crowd was almost preparing for a fifth round when he broke and had four other options to get 4-1 and serve. Nadal came out of the labyrinth he had gotten into and with 4-2 he accelerated to deactivate his rival and take the last four games to advance to the round.

Nadal's pass to the second round was the only good news for the 'Armada' on this day, along with the classification of Roberto Bautista. The man from Castellón, with a good rhythm after making the final in Mallorca, barely gave the Hungarian Attila Balazs a chance, whom he defeated 6-1, 6-0, 6-3 and without losing his serve.

Instead, the veteran Feliciano López said goodbye to the London 'big', in his 'big' 81, equaling Federer's record, against the Dutch Botic van de Zandschulp (6-2, 6-3, 6-3), Bernabé Zapata, against American Jack Sock (7-6(6), 6-4, 6-4), Carlos Taberner, in his postponed match against fellow American Reilly Opelka (7-6(5), 6-4, 6- 4), Pedro Martínez, against the Slovakian Alex Molcan in four sets (4-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-1), and Roberto Carballés, eliminated by the Australian Jordan Thompson (6-4, 6-1 , 6-1).