Rafael Nadal: Road to Paris starts in Acapulco

Since Rafael Nadal last played a tournament match – a crushing fifth set injury retirement against Marin Cilic in their Australian Open quarter-final – sponsorship duties have taken the 31-year-old from a bank in Alicante to a sports medicine clinic in Madrid, and beyond.

Nadal has submitted himself to anti-inflammatory physiotherapy treatment and rehabilitation, tested a commemorative new racquet at home in Majorca, then taken his annual trip to the luxury resorts he part-owns on the Mexican Caribbean island of Cozumel.

The Spaniard’s February schedule may not have been altered by the torn hip muscle that extended his problematic history at Melbourne Park, but recent events in Rotterdam ensured that something else was: the No.1 ranking, now repossessed by the ageless Roger Federer.

> VIDEO: Nadal not focused on regaining No.1 spot

When Nadal’s brief hiatus ends at the Mexican Open in Acapulco this week, it will be in another familiar place: as the world No.2.

“It’s incredible to see Roger back to world number one; congratulations to him, he did so well the last year,” Nadal told atpworldtour.com. “He deserves it.”

Even assuming that all goes well with the Spaniard’s latest recovery, top spot cannot be regained before Indian Wells by the man who in 2017 held it at year’s-end for a third time.

What was a relatively minor injury was nevertheless the latest of many for a champion whose previous season finished early due to another bout of knee soreness, and whose 2018 started late for the same chronic, tedious reason.

Nadal starts countdown to clay

If the frustration that was evident against Cilic – and afterwards – is hardly new territory, and while Federer ponders whether to play a limited clay-court schedule, if at all, Nadal can at least start to count down the weeks until his favourite stretch of the season begins.

He is the top seed in a Mexican Open field that also includes Sascha Zverev, Dominic Thiem and Juan Martin del Potro, with Nadal having won the Acapulco title in 2005 and 2013, and finished a surprising runner-up to Sam Querrey in 2017.

Nadal begins his 2018 campaign against fellow Spaniard Feliciano Lopez in round one.

But he will carry a different weapon this year, with reports in the Spanish media that the words ‘La Decima’ (‘The 10th’) have been inscribed just above the handle of the new and colourful Babolat, while the frame also celebrates the extraordinary achievement that is 10 French Open triumphs – the most recent without the loss of a set.

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In fact, easier than listing all his triumphs at Roland Garros is naming the only three years (2009, 2015 and 2016) that Nadal failed to win since that remarkable 2005 debut.

Little wonder that when speaking in Alicante earlier this month, where he declared himself confident of being fresh and fully recovered for the so-called “Sunshine Double” in Indian Wells and Miami, Nadal admitted he was eyeing the bigger targets that lie further on the horizon.

“Logically, the clay-court season is central,’’ he said. “And my big goal is to come back to being the best player in the world on clay.’’

Zverev was halfway through primary school the last time Nadal was anything other than the man to beat on clay, with the main caveat to the extension of that marvellous record being the ability of the 16-time major winner’s battle-weary body to come to the party for an 11th serving of precious Parisian silverware.

Yet consider the physical issues afflicting or sidelining so many rivals, combined with Federer’s potential no-show should he follow last year’s successful blueprint to Wimbledon success. Recall, too, that Nadal swept last year’s lead-up events in Monte Carlo, Barcelona and Madrid before a shock one-off loss to Thiem in the Rome quarter-finals ahead of that utter dominance at Roland Garros.

All of which adds up to a champion with more titles and points to defend than compelling cases being made by those seeking to dethrone history’s greatest clay-courter. Nadal’s latest comeback steps are being made on a Mexican hardcourt, but his ultimate destination is in absolutely no doubt.