Rafael Nadal thanks Brazilian soccer superstar Ronaldo after he proudly shows off his support for the Spaniard

Brazilian football legend Ronaldo Luís Nazário de Lima recently showed off his support for Rafael Nadal as he donned shorts bearing the 22-time Grand Slam champion's logo.

During Ronaldo's playing days, he earned 98 caps for the Brazilian national team and won two FIFA World Cup trophies. In his club career, Ronaldo played for some of the biggest teams in Europe and South America, including Real Madrid, Inter Milan, Barcelona, Corinthians, and others.

On Sunday, Ronaldo posted a video on his Instagram story featuring him sporting purple shorts with Rafael Nadal's logo, a stylized version of a bull. He then captioned the image "Vamos," which means "let's go" in Portuguese. A few hours later, the Spaniard shared the video on his Instagram story and thanked him in Portuguese, saying "obrigado."

images from their Instagram story

Nadal withdrew from the ongoing Indian Wells Open just 24 hours before facing Milos Raonic in the first round. He spent most of 2023 on the sidelines due to injury and made his return at the 2024 Brisbane International, where he was knocked out in the quarterfinals. After the tournament, he sustained another injury, causing him to miss both the Australian Open and the Qatar Open.

Rafael Nadal is scheduled to play at the 2024 Monte Carlo open

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The 37-year-old is scheduled to participate in the 2024 Monte Carlo Open in April, as announced by the tournament organizers. Nadal will be using a protected ranking to get into the main draw of this season's edition.

At a recent press conference in Paris, the tournament director, David Massey, stated that the Spaniard had initially felt some discomfort and was scared, so he decided not to play at Indian Wells. However, after undergoing tests, it showed nothing alarming.

“He felt some discomfort, so he was scared and decided not to play at Indian Wells, but the tests he underwent showed nothing,” David Massey said

He added that they also sent him the balls that will be used in this year's edition of the tournament for him to practice at his academy in Mallorca.

“We sent him two boxes of balls to Mallorca so that he could practice” Massey added

Nadal has competed in the tournament 17 times throughout his career and has won it a record 11 times, including claiming the title eight times consecutively from 2005 to 2012.

On the record list, the only active players with two trophies are Novak Djokovic and Stefanos Tsitsipas.

The last time Nadal won the Monte Carlo Open was in 2018 when he defeated the likes of Aljaž Bedene, Karen Khachanov, Dominic Thiem, and Grigor Dimitrov before triumphing over Japan's Kei Nishikori in the final.

As for his recent participation, the 37-year-old competed in the Monte Carlo Open in 2021, reaching the quarterfinals but was eventually knocked out by Andrey Rublev.