The 22-time Grand Slam winner crashed in his season-opening match at the mixed teams United Cup in Sydney to 12th-ranked Cameron Norrie and then again to Australia’s Alex de Minaur.
Against the Australian, the Spaniard dropped six consecutive games after leading by a set and 1-0. The 36-year-old top seed faces a testing first-round clash at Melbourne Park tomorrow against emerging 21-year-old Briton Jack Draper, who reached the Adelaide semi-finals this week.
“Probably one of the toughest first rounds possible... young, powerful, growing very, very fast in the rankings, playing well,” he said.
“A big challenge for me at the beginning to start the tournament. Let’s see. I’m here to just give myself a chance. I know he’s playing well.”
Nadal has lost six of his last seven matches stretching back to defeat to Frances Tiafoe in the last 16 at the US Open.
Asked if he felt vulnerable, the defending champion admitted: “Of course, without a doubt.
“I have been losing more than usual, that’s part of the business. Just accept the situation. I think I am humble enough to accept that situation and just work with what I have today.
“I need to build again all this momentum. I need to build again this confidence with myself with victories. But it’s true that I have been losing more than usual.”
Nadal, who recently became a father, swept past Russian Daniil Medvedev to win the Australian Open and a 21st Grand Slam title last year in an epic five-setter.
That victory came after arch-rival and nine-time Australian Open winner Djokovic was detained and deported ahead of the tournament after refusing to get vaccinated for Covid-19.
The Serbian star, looking to equal Nadal’s record-breaking 22 Slam titles, is back this year and in top form after winning the Adelaide International I event last week. That followed another ATP Finals crown in late 2022.
Nadal told Spanish reporters that his long-time rival was the clear favourite.
“Djokovic seems to be very well prepared. He got great results at the end of the year, he has also started the year winning. It is a tournament that has always been good to him,” he said.
“If we talk about favourites, on Saturday before the start of the tournament, there is no doubt that he is the top favourite to win the title.
“But tournaments are not won on the Saturday before, you have to work for two weeks, although he has shown that he knows how to do it very well.
“If he wins, we will congratulate him, he will have done something historic, and that’s it. My life is not going to change.”
Despite losing his only two matches this year, Nadal insisted he was improving by the day and had practised more in the last few weeks than ever before.
“My personal momentum is not bad, I tell you. I am good and happy. I’m practising well,” he said. “I feel faster in the legs. I feel I’m playing better with more confidence,” he added.
“The last three weeks of preparation here have been very positive from my point of view.”
‘New generation unlikely to win so many Slams’
Rafael Nadal cast doubt yesterday on whether the new generation of players led by fellow Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz could ever match the feats of himself, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer.
The ‘Big Three’ have dominated the sport over the past 15 years, compiling an incredible 63 Grand Slams between them so far.
With Federer now retired and Nadal and Djokovic aged 36 and 35 respectively, the focus is turning to who can take their place.
Alcaraz, 19, is leading the charge after becoming the youngest world number one since the creation of the ATP rankings in 1973 by winning his first Grand Slam tournament at the US Open last September.
He then became the youngest player in history to finish the year at the top of the rankings, and
the first outside of Djokovic, Nadal, Federer and Andy Murray to do so since Andy Roddick in 2003.
Danish teenager Holger Rune, who shocked Djokovic to clinch his first Masters title in Paris in November, is another on the charge, along with the likes of world number three Stefanos Tsitsipas.
Nadal praised the ‘next-gen’ as “super-good” but said he wasn’t sure they could dominate in the way he, Djokovic and Federer have.
“Carlos has one Grand Slam, the others have zero yet. If we start talking about achieving 22 Grand Slams, 21, 20, I mean, it’s a big deal,” he said.
“That can happen, yes. Why not? But at the same time it never happened in the past. Will not be easy that happen two generations in a row.
“That’s just putting the logical perspective on the room,” he added.
“They are super good, they’re going to have amazing careers, they’re going to win Slams, they’re going to win a lot of tournaments, yes. But I’m almost sure not two players of this generation are going to achieve 20, 21, and 22 Grand Slams.”
World number one Alcaraz is not at Melbourne Park after pulling out with an injury.
Nadal said it was easy for people to forget how hard it had been for himself and his two great rivals to achieve what they had.
“I mean, probably because there have been three players that achieved that much, we lose a little bit the perspective of how difficult is all of this,” he said.
“We are here playing tennis at the age of 36, and you need to have a very, very long career. Injuries are there, circumstances in life.
“Don’t talk about the level of tennis because that’s probably a thing you can have, but then there are a lot of different facts in life that can happen that makes this situation or these results difficult.”
Leading Grand Slam title winners
22- Rafael Nadal (ESP)
21-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
20-Roger Federer (SUI)
14-Pete Sampras (USA)
12-Roy Emerson (AUS)
11-Rod Laver (AUS), Bjorn Borg (SWE)
10-Bill Tilden (USA)
9-Fred Perry (GBR), Ken Rosewall (AUS), Ivan Lendl, Andre Agassi, Jimmy Connors (all USA)
Champions this century
2022 - Rafael Nadal (ESP)
2021 - Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2020-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2019-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2018-Roger Federer (SUI)
2017-Roger Federer (SUI)
2016-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2015-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2014-Stan Wawrinka (SUI)
2013-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2012-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2011-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2010-Roger Federer (SUI)
2009-Rafael Nadal (ESP)
2008-Novak Djokovic (SRB)
2007- Roger Federer (SUI)
2006-Roger Federer (SUI)
2005-Marat Safin (RUS)
2004-Roger Federer (SUI)
2003-Andre Agassi (USA)
2002-Thomas Johansson (SWE)
2001-Andre Agassi (USA)
2000-Andre Agassi (USA)
