Rafa Nadal pulls out of Wimbledon due to injury

Rafa Nadal announced on Thursday evening that he is withdrawing from Wimbledon after suffering an abdominal tear during his quarter-final match against Taylor Fritz on Wednesday. The Spaniard was set to play Nick Kyrgios this Friday afternoon (8 July) in the semi-final.

In Thursday's press conference, Nadal explained his decision. "As you can imagine, if I'm here it's because I have to pull out of the tournament. As everybody saw yesterday, I had been suffering with a pain in my abdominals and I knew that something wasn't okay there," he said.

The Mallorcan confirmed that it was a tear in his abdominal muscle that was the cause for his pain. "I was thinking about the decision to make all day. It's a very tough circumstance and it's obvious that if I keep going the injury is going to get worse and worse."

Nadal's decision means that Australian Nick Kyrgios will receive a walkover and will compete in his first ever Grand Slam final, where he will face either Novak Djokovic or Cameron Norrie.