{"id":485427,"date":"2024-07-19T14:22:49","date_gmt":"2024-07-19T18:22:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/?post_type=news&#038;p=485427"},"modified":"2024-07-19T14:34:40","modified_gmt":"2024-07-19T18:34:40","slug":"nadal-continues-to-improve-reaches-first-semi-final-of-the-season","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/news\/nadal-continues-to-improve-reaches-first-semi-final-of-the-season\/","title":{"rendered":"Nadal continues to improve, reaches first semi-final of the season"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Rafael Nadal endured a grueling three-hour-and-58-minute battle to secure his first semi-final appearance of the year, coming from behind to defeat Argentine Mariano Navone at the Swedish Open. The 38-year-old Spaniard knocked out the fourth seed 6-7 (2-7) 7-5 7-5, setting up a semi-final clash with Croatia&#8217;s Duje Ajdukovic.<\/p>\n<p>Nadal, also slated to compete in the doubles semi-finals with Casper Ruud against Brazil&#8217;s Orlando Luz and Rafael Matos, is preparing to partner with Carlos Alcaraz at the upcoming Olympics in Paris.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">RAFAEL. NADAL. \ud83e\udd2f<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RafaelNadal?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">@RafaelNadal<\/a> comes through a 4 HOUR CLASSIC vs Navone to make his first semi-final since Wimbledon 2022!<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NordeaOpen?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">#NordeaOpen<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/G3tdRiJfr5\" target=\"_blank\">pic.twitter.com\/G3tdRiJfr5<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Tennis TV (@TennisTV) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/TennisTV\/status\/1814323479358882243?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">July 19, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>The match featured some exceptional tennis, with Navone taking the lead by winning a first-set tie-break. Despite breaking Navone twice in the second set to lead 3-0, Nadal&#8217;s level dropped, allowing the Argentine to win four consecutive games. However, Nadal broke again to make it 6-5 and held his nerve to level the match.<\/p>\n<p>The 22-time Grand Slam champion faced further challenges in the final set, failing to serve out the match at the first attempt but closing it out on the second try.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Nadal is building some STRONG momentum.<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/NordeaOpen?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">#NordeaOpen<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/q3Lj3ZkxZF\" target=\"_blank\">pic.twitter.com\/q3Lj3ZkxZF<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Roland-Garros (@rolandgarros) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rolandgarros\/status\/1814323639757553767?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">July 19, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;First of all, I&#8217;m looking forward to the afternoon and trying to recover this body,&#8221; said Nadal after the match. &#8220;Even if it&#8217;s a young body, I would need to work and recover once and for all. I will see how I wake up tomorrow.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rafael Nadal endured a grueling three-hour-and-58-minute battle to secure his first semi-final appearance of the year, coming from behind to defeat Argentine Mariano [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":137,"featured_media":485428,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false},"tags":[17409],"news_category":[16714],"gn_keywords":[767],"acf":{"announce":"Nadal Overcomes Navone in nearly four-hour battle, advances to face Ajdukovic","video":[]},"rank_math_focus_keyword":"","rank_math_description":"","rank_math_title":"","rank_math_robots":"","rank_math_canonical_url":"","rank_math_facebook_title":"","rank_math_facebook_description":"","rank_math_facebook_image":"","rank_math_twitter_title":"","rank_math_twitter_description":"","rank_math_twitter_image":"","rank_math_snippet_shortcode":"","rank_math_primary_category":"","rankmath_seo":{"focus_keyword":"","description":"","title":"","canonical_url":"","robots":"","facebook":{"title":"","description":"","image":""},"twitter":{"title":"","description":"","image":""}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/485427"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/137"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=485427"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/485427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":485430,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/485427\/revisions\/485430"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/485428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=485427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=485427"},{"taxonomy":"news_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news_category?post=485427"},{"taxonomy":"gn_keywords","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/7sport.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/gn_keywords?post=485427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}