Rafael Nadal withdraws from Wimbledon semifinals because of abdominal tear

Rafael Nadal withdrew from Wimbledon on Thursday on the eve of  his semifinal match against Nick Kyrgios.

The 22-time Grand Slam champion pulled out because of a seven-millimeter abdominal tear. He clearly suffered during his five-set tiebreak win over American Taylor Fritz in Wednesday’s quarterfinals and said after that match he hoped he would be ready to play Friday.

Nadal, 36, informed Wimbledon officials after a 45-minute practice on Thursday that he would not be fit to compete.

“It makes me very sad to say that,” Nadal said.

Kyrgios, who had advanced to his first career Grand Slam semifinal, will now be in his first Grand Slam final. He will play the winner of Friday’s other semifinal, between No. 1 Novak Djokovic and No. 9 seed Cameron Norrie of Britain, on Sunday.

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“I was thinking during the whole day about the decision to make but I think it’s, yeah … it don’t make sense to go, even if I tried a lot of times in my career to keep going. It’s obvious if I keep going the injury is going to be worse and worse,” Nadal said.

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