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BNP PARIBAS OPEN

March 16, 2019

Rafael Nadal

Indian Wells, California

THE MODERATOR: Rafa has just announced he's withdrawing from the semifinal with Roger Federer due to a knee injury.

Rafa, can you tell us what happened today?

RAFAEL NADAL: No, nothing more than what you saw yesterday. As I said yesterday after the match, I felt that something happened in the knee and was not the moment to talk about that because remain 24 hours before the semifinal, and I wanted to try my best to be competitive today.

I warm up today in the morning, and I felt that my knee was not enough good to compete at the level that I need to compete, to play semifinals match of this event.

THE MODERATOR: I'll open it up for a few questions.

Q. Is there some extra disappointment just given the history between you guys, this matchup, having to pull out?
RAFAEL NADAL: For me is not about only today. It's about what means for me to have to pull out in a tournament that I love so much like this one, and in the semifinals after playing well during the whole tournament. You can imagine that I can't be happy. So that's all, yeah.

Sometimes is tough and can be frustrating for me sometimes personally to go through all this stuff.

Q. What's next for you? Have you already spoken to your doctor? What do you think you're going to do in the next few days?
RAFAEL NADAL: What I gonna do is come back home and try to do a smooth transition to clay. Try to be 100% for the first event. That gonna be Monte-Carlo for me.

Q. If you think about the decision at the US Open, is the pain the same? Is it less worrying? It took you out for a long time after New York.
RAFAEL NADAL: I can't answer you today, as you can imagine. But I know how it is, and I know what I have to do. But still, still tough because I felt more or less okay during this beginning of the season in terms of my knee. Yesterday I felt this on court.

So now it starts the process that I have to decide what direction we have to take to recover well and to recover as soon as possible.

Being honest, I don't have doubts today that I will be ready for Monte-Carlo. But at the same time, I need to check with my people what's the best way to proceed now. It is a situation that we were not expecting at this point, so now we need to adjust a little bit all the calendar.

Q. I appreciate two of the Grand Slams are played on hard courts, but are you getting to the stage where you're thinking it's just not in your best interest to continue to play on hard courts?
RAFAEL NADAL: No, not at all. I am a tennis player, and to be a tennis player, I have to play on all the surfaces. My goal is to play on all the surfaces.

Another thing is adjust my calendar to the way that I need. But that not means that I'm not gonna play in the hard courts.

Q. The frustrations obviously continue. Can you say with this injury are you in constant pain or is it certain movements or you just don't feel confident pushing off on that leg?
RAFAEL NADAL: I have this since long time ago. Some moments are better; some moments are worse. Always stays there. And always remind me, limit me to practice less the way that I want and to play less than I want. But it's not the moment to complain much. With all this stuff, I still where I am today.

And the week have been positive until yesterday. So I feel myself competitive when I am healthy, and my goal is to be healthy as many weeks as possible to keep playing and at the highest level possible and for the most important things.

So my goal don't change. And even if sometimes is tough for me, yeah, to accept all these things that I am going through during all my career, yeah, sometimes I feel sad because I feel always in disadvantage comparing with all my opponents in terms of preparation and in terms of practice and sometimes under competition.

But at the same time, in the other hand, I went through fantastic moments and still going with that feelings a lot of times.

So I just gonna keep going, and I just gonna keep doing the things that works well for me and accepting that sometimes these issues can happen. So all the things that are in my hands I am doing well. The things that I can't control, I can't control.

So accept the situation even if today is a sad moment for me. Try to be always positive and grateful with all the things that tennis give to me and life give to me. So I can't complain much, because I feel very fortunate for all the things that I did in this life and happened to me in the world of tennis.

So is normal that after all those things you go through, sad and tough moments, too, and that's it. Just keep going.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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