He lorded over the hallowed Roland Garros clay for a better part of his career with aplomb, but all good things as they say comes to and Or so it seems with Rafael Nadal.
The 'King of Clay' and 22-times Grand Slam champion was sent crashing out of the French Open in his first round match by Germany's Alexander Zverev 6-3, 7-6, 6-3.
The defeat which is seen by many as Nadal's swansong at the French Open, which he has clinched a record 14 times and been an absolute master of one of the trickiest surfaces in professional tennis.
Nadal's loss to the fourth seeded Zverev brings the curtains down on one of the longest love affairs in Grand Slam tennis.
The Spaniard from Mallorca has an astounding 112-4 record at the prestigious tournament and some of Nadal's biggest rival like the legendary Novak Djokovic, fellow Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz and Iga Swiatek, a well-known Nadal superfan were in attendance.
With the Paris Olympics fast approaching later this year, Nadal was hoping to feature for Spain perhaps one last time and grace the Court Philippe-Chatrier to regale and enthrall his ardent Parisian fans.
The Spanish icon was struggling with an injury suffered post the 2023 Australian Open and had lost out in being in action for a large majority of the last season.
If Nadal indeed officially announces this appearance as his last at the French Open, the annual slugfest of the best of the best in world tennis for The Musketeers Cup would never be the same leaving a huge void that can be seldom be filled so easily in the years to come.
