Nadal Loses to 135th Ranked Player in the First Round

Rosol was that player last year stunning Nadal in the second round at the All England Club in a five set thriller that ended up being Nadal s last match for seven months.

This year s unlikely tormentor was Steve Darcis a 29 year old Belgian veteran ranked 135th who had spent part of this season toiling in the minor leagues of professional tennis the challenger circuit.

But against the fifth seeded Nadal the flashy Darcis nicknamed Shark because of the shark tattoo on his shoulder was a highly effective predator producing cocksure forehand winners timely first serves and an alluring blend of full stretch defense and storm the net offense that often left Nadal looking surprised and off balance.

In the end Nadal the great Spanish champion who just won his eighth French Open could not win so much as a set as he crashed out in the first round of a Grand Slam event for the first time in singles losing by 7 6 (7 4) 7 6 (10 8) 6 4.

At the end it s not a tragedy Nadal said. That is sport.

It was an inadvertent echo of a long ago quotation from Boris Becker when he was stunned in the second round of Wimbledon by the Australian journeyman Peter Doohan in 1987. No one died out there I just lost a tennis match said Becker the two time defending champion.

Nadal has also won two Wimbledon titles but in the end Darcis s victory seemed surprisingly shockingly straightforward although it could have become more complex in a hurry if Nadal had converted on his lone set point in the second set.

Darcis was not without references at the club. He upset Tomas Berdych who was seeded sixth in the first round of last year s Olympic tournament in London. But make no mistake. Despite that success and despite Nadal s lack of grass court preparation this year this was still one of the biggest upsets in Wimbledon history. It was without question the biggest first round surprise since little known Ivo Karlovic ambushed the defending champion Lleyton Hewitt in 2003.

I think nobody gave me the slightest chance to win today Darcis said.

Asked what his reaction had been when he saw the draw Darcis grinned and said a four letter word.

Nadal who turned 27 this month declined repeatedly and with increasing irritation to use his left knee as an excuse. I answered this question three times or four times already he said in English. I don t gonna talk about my knee this afternoon. Only that can say today is congratulate Steve Darcis. He played a fantastic match. Everything that I will say today about my knee is an excuse and I don t like to put any excuse when I m losing a match like I lost today. He deserve not one excuse.

It was the first genuine setback since Nadal returned to the circuit in February after a seven month break because of the knee problems. Coming into Wimbledon he had played in nine tournaments and reached each final winning seven titles including the French Open little more than two weeks ago.

But in an attempt to protect his knee Nadal had played all but one of those nine tournaments on clay. The original plan was to play a warm up tournament before Wimbledon on grass in Halle Germany. Instead Nadal withdrew from that event and spent the week recovering on his home island Majorca. He arrived at Wimbledon last Tuesday and with plenty of help from Darcis was unable to make up for missed grass court matches.

Nadal had only lost once to a player ranked lower than Darcis. That was indoors in 2006 in Stockholm against Joachim Johansson who was ranked 690th.

On Monday he made uncharacteristic errors and struggled to counter the slice that Darcis produced with his one handed backhand. Perhaps most significant Nadal struggled to move freely in the final phases of the match. Though he showed no sign of pain in the early stages he was clearly hampered near the end struggling to reach balls usually in his range and limping noticeably after some exchanges.

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