Rafael Nadal plays No. 4 seed Alexander Zverev in the first round of the French Open, which starts Sunday.
Nadal, due to missing most of the last year and a half due to injuries, is unseeded at a Grand Slam for the first time since the 2005 Australian Open.
Being unseeded meant the record 14-time French Open champion faced the possibility of drawing a seeded player in the first round.
He drew Zverev, the Tokyo Olympic gold medalist who two weeks ago won the Italian Open, the last top-level ATP Tour event before the French Open.
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Nadal and Zverev last met in the 2022 French Open semifinals.
Nadal led that match 7-6 (8), 6-6 when Zverev retired after tearing right ankle ligaments. Zverev missed the rest of the season.
Nadal, 37, missed last year’s French Open with a left hip flexor injury and underwent surgery last June. In announcing his withdrawal before last year’s French Open, Nadal said that he will likely retire in the second half of 2024.
In more recent comments, Nadal has not ruled out playing beyond 2023. At his last tournament in Rome earlier this month, he said he was “98%” sure it was his last time playing that annual event.
Nadal has played 15 matches since the start of 2023. He went 5-3 over three clay-court tournaments this spring building up to the French Open.
“Physically I have some issues, but not probably yet enough to say not playing in the most important event of my tennis career,” he said after his most recent match, a 6-1, 6-3 defeat to Hubert Hurkacz of Poland on May 11. “So let’s see what’s going on, how I feel myself mentally tomorrow, after tomorrow, and in one week, and if I feel ready, I going to try to be there and fight for the things that I have been fighting the last 15 years, if now seems impossible.”
