AJÁNLOM AZ OLDALT
THE LAST ONE AT THE 2007 WIMBLEDON !!!
Hi everyone,
Where do I start? Or should I say finish? I suppose this is an end. An end to this diary that I have been doing since Wimbledon 2007 started. I could have done it yesterday night but I am sure you all understand that it was probably not the best thing to do.
A lot of people asked me why didn't I do the last one from Paris? The reason is obvious, we went out to celebrate and did not have time. After the end of the match I did not stop until we finished with the party. Here, today or yesterday it has been different.
I am not going to go into details, into what I felt, into my thoughts, into the whole thing. I am just going to say I have great memories of these 2 weeks. I think I improved, I learned things, I played good matches, difficult ones, and I got to the final again. What happened in the final has been already written a lot, analyzed and said. The only thing I am going to say is that I was sad, very sad to lose the final since I thought I could have won it. Roger is the best, we know that, but I had my chances yesterday. It's over now and it's better for me not to think about it anymore (but it is difficult!).
This is not a post to write about my feelings or about the match. I suppose this is what you all want to know. As I say I was sad, very sad, right after the match, but I have always said that I am also a good loser and forgets quickly. There are things in life, in the World we live in that are really bad and serious. To lose a match, even if it is the final of THE tennis tournament is something that only really affects me. And that's OK. I can cope with it. I will try again next year and I will work hard to keep improving.
I am writing or actually dictating this blog from home tonight. My real home in Manacor. Last night we just had a quite dinner my uncle Toni, his wife Joana Maria, my uncle Miguel Angel, Rafa Maymo, Benito and Tuts. That's it.
Simple, quite, easy. We talked a lot during dinner and watched some funny things and sports things in youtube. We remembered times of my uncle playing football, saw goals of great footballers, etc. Nothing special see? Probably a not happy night but that's OK. My father, mother, sister, Carlos Costa, ant Maria Magdalena and others went to the IMG house for dinner and to get little hours of sleep, We left London very early. It was planned like that.
Win or lose. I had a flight with my family booked at 6 am arriving at 9.15 am, so we left the house at 3.30 to the airport. Not much sleep but at least I was home early and have one more day of holidays. I will stay here and not play tennis until probably Friday.
So as a closing thing (sorry for this poor expression), I want to thank the people who helped me with this blog. Benito, my PR manager for helping me every day with it. Carlos Costa, my manager and friend, for giving me ideas and feedback from fans. The Times for hosting it and give me this space to write. I hope I was at the level required to write in it. Maybe I have a second career there in the future :-). Neil and James from the newspaper for moving it forward and specially, James, for the Gambas he sent us :-). And a very big special thanks you to all the readers of this blog and the people supporting me. I hear it's had a lot of people reading it so I am happy for that. Believe me that there were times I really didn't feel to write but I had the compromise and you have to honour them.
Thank you everybody.
Rafa Nadal
DID IT AGAIN. NOW A DREAM IS WAITING!!!
Hello everybody
I know some people makes fun of this sentence I am going to say: "I am very, very happy". But the truth is that I am, very, very happy. Not sure that if someone would have told me some weeks ago, Rafa you will be playing on Sunday, July 8th in the Wimbledon final against Roger Federer, I would have believed it.
I knew I could have a chance, I knew that I was going to give it my all, but I also knew it was going to be very difficult if not almost impossible. On the other hand I also thought I would not be playing tomorrow in the final after all the rain... :-) Me nor any other player. Unbelievable how the weather has been and how it changed today.
It was the nicer day in London I have seen since I got here after Paris. And on this beautiful day I think I play not well. Novak played really good. He is very good, he is up there and I think he will be at the top one day.
I was happy on one hand to win, to do it fast, but at the same time sorry for Novak and also the crowd to see how the match went. It is not always nice to see someone has to retire. But I suppose that's also the competition. It is tough.
Today almost all my direct family was there to support me. My father and my uncle as I said yesterday came from Spain and so did my aunt, who is the twin sister of my uncle Miguel Angel (once again wrongly called the Beast of Barcelona, since he is not a beast and he is not from Barcelona... :-) Also Toni's wife and a couple of friends came. Obviously not all are at my home since we don't fit in all. But I guess you don't care much about this so I guess I would talk again about the gambas (shrimps) I had today... :-)
I am actually attaching a picture of the dinner tonight. It is me, Carlos, my uncle Miguel Angel, Tuts from Nike, Benito my PR manager and Rafa Maymo my physio. We all decided to stay at home and have dinner. The gambas was again a gift from James at the Times Online and now that I know it is him, I want to thank you again. They were really good and thanks to you I have changed my mind and I do say that you have great shrimps here to. Close to the ones we have is Spain... :-) Who knows they might have been fished there :-). Seriously thanks and we had a great dinner. I cooked the pasta and Benito the gambas al ajillo which is something very typical Spanish. Shrimps deep fried in oil with garlic.
Coming back to what this final is, and what it means I suppose I have to finish the tournament to really think about it well. To win Wimbledon would be a real dream that comes true.
But let's not get too excited. In front of me tomorrow I will have the best player ever and therefore the one you would not want to meet in a final of Wimbledon.
Regarding this blog, if I win tomorrow I won't have time to write it because with the media things to do and then the official dinner so I would not have time. And if I lose I will try it although I can't promise it. Not because I lost, but because I am sure we will do like last year and go out for dinner with all the family, friends and sponsors. I hear that we are 28 tomorrow, apart from me playing of course :-) I will write thought the final one tomorrow or Monday.
Anyway I have to than you all for the support you've given me these weeks here in the UK and let's see how it goes.
Thanks
Rafa
Hi everyone!!!
I am very excited to be writing this blog again and very excited to be doing it as the previous one to a big day. It is my second semi-final here in Wimbledon and I am very happy to be here. Things went very, very well today.
I woke up early. I think it was 5 am. Not that I was nervous, that I normally am, but because the light is so strong in the room I have and I forgot to put the mask (? Not sure it is the right word and we are too tired now to look for it). I am writing the blog at 11.30 pm and really want to go to bed.
But as I say I got up to get the mask and went back to sleep. I woke up, really woke up at 8.15 and went downstairs for breakfast. Since that other day that the milk was bad, I am very careful and double check it is good. I had a big bowl of cereals with milk mixed with chocolate. I normally read the press while having breakfast, well read the internet editions of the papers. I normally read the Spanish newspapers starting with the sports one, check what's up with tennis, see what's written, then go to the
football sections, etc. I like to see how the buys and sells of the teams are going now. Then I also look at the general interest newspapers to see how things are going around the world.
I left to the site a bit earlier than what I thought. I guess I was a bit nervous as usual or impatient and I preferred to get there early. I was there around 8.55 and ready to get my warm up. Carlos Costa stayed at the players reception to get sorted all the tickets and I got my warm up around 9.30am. Now towards the end of the tournament we get many more requests and today we had around 14 people that came from Spain. I had like 6 people of 2 of my sponsors here today. Some have been here the whole week like the guys from NIKE, Nico and Roy. Tuts, also from NIKE Spain, came today and also the big shots from NIKE USA are here. Also two from TIME FORCE, my watch sponsor, came from Spain. That together with some friends of my uncle Toni that came from Mallorca and the owner of the Spanish restaurant El Cambio de Tercio, Abel, and his girlfriend who also have been coming the whole week. Anyway lots of people around that I am very thankful to them.
Tomorrow I will also be supported by my father and my uncle Miguel Angel, the former football player that are coming tonight. They are getting in pretty late. I think they are scheduled to arrive at the house around 3am.
By the way, I hear that my uncle Miguel Angel is called here in the UK "The Beast of Barcelona". That's shocking since he was not the kind of player that used to be dirty. He was a defender but I think very elegant and technical. For some reason I don't know they call him like that here. Definitely not in Spain. But no worries, everything OK :-)
As I say this is my second semis here at Wimbledon and that makes me very happy. I think that semis is a good result already on grass but I will try as much and as hard I can to be in the final on Sunday. Don't take me wrong, I am not happy just with the fact of reaching semis. If you know me you know
I want more but if you take an objective look at this, it is a heck of a result. It is just amazing, it would be amazing for me if I can make it again. I know that tomorrow's match is very difficult.
See you tomorrow !!!
Rafa
