Rafael Nadal: "Naomi Osaka said she lost a little bit the love for the game, that never happened to me"

Rafael Nadal believes that there is one major difference between his and Naomi Osaka's respective comebacks at the Brisbane International this week — while the Japanese lost her love for the game a bit, it was never the case with Nadal.

The Spaniard played only four competitive matches in the 2023 season, suffering a hip injury at the Australian Open and then spending the rest of the year in recovery. Osaka, on the other hand, skipped the entire year as she was on a maternity break.

The duo are now both in Brisbane to mark their returns to tennis. While Osaka has been drawn to play against Tamara Korpatsch in her opener at the WTA 500 event, the Spaniard's opening-round opponent at the ATP 250 event is yet to be known.

Speaking at his pre-tournament press conference, the 22-time Grand Slam champion was asked about his thoughts on Osaka's comeback, under the context that she had admitted that she briefly considered retirement during the break.

Nadal, however, made it clear that unlike Naomi Osaka, who has spoken out previously about how she lost her passion and motivation for tennis before, he has always been in love with the game. In his case, the only reason he took a break was because the condition of his body made it physically impossible for him to continue playing.

"I think Naomi and I completely different situation. I think Naomi, if I'm not wrong, she said that she lost a little bit the love for the game for a while and the passion for the game," Nadal said.

"Something that never happened to me. So the biggest difference. She gets tired or lost little bit the motivation for this game or for this thing. That never happened to me. I had to be away because my body was not able to keep going," he added.

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"If I thought about retirement during that period of time? Of course, yes" - Rafael Nadal

Australia Brisbane Tennis

Rafael Nadal, however, conceded that he did consider retirement during his 2023 break, which he felt was not out of the ordinary but rather a very human reaction to the difficult situation he was in at the time.

What the Spaniard thought was more important was the fact that he found the determination to keep going after that moment of weakness and decided to make a successful return to the tour.

"If I thought about retirement during that period of time? Of course, yes. I had to went through a lot of things to be back. Sometimes, of course, in the low moments, it's 100% human that you put yourself in a position to say, Okay, makes sense all the things I have to do to be back at 37 years old, knowing probably you will be back and you will not be healthy enough to compete the way that you wanted to compete," Rafael Nadal said.

"Something of that, of course, I was asking to myself. At some point I decided to keep going, no? I had the determination to keep going," he added.