Injured Nadal pulls out of Wimbledon semi-final against Kyrgios

Rafael Nadal has been forced to pull out of his scheduled semi-final against Nick Kyrgios at Wimbledon because of the abdominal injury suffered in his quarter-final against Taylor Fritz.

Nadal, who won the first two slams of the year, somehow came through a five-set match against the American on Wednesday despite both his sister and father indicating he should retire because of the injury.

Reports in Spain earlier on Thursday indicated that a scan had shown Nadal had suffered a 7mm abdominal tear but that he hoped to play. The 36-year-old then practised gingerly at Aorangi Park but later confirmed the news of the tear at a hastily arranged press conference at Wimbledon.

Nadal said: “Unfortunately as you can imagine I am here because I have to pull out from the tournament. As everyone saw yesterday I have been suffering with a pain in the abdominal and something was not OK there. That is confirmed, I have a tear in the muscle and the communication is too late.

“I was thinking the whole day I was thinking about the decision to make but I think it doesn’t make sense to go, even if I try through my career to keep going. It is very tough circumstances but it is obvious if I keep going the injury will be worse and worse.”

It means Nick Kygrios will reach his first grand slam final with a walkover, the first player ever to do so in the open era. He will face either Cameron Norrie or Novak Djokovic, who will play their semi-final on Centre Court on Friday.

Nadal insisted he made his tough decision due to the abdominal issue preventing him from being able to serve. “I never thought about the calendar slam, I thought about my diary and my happiness,” Nadal said. “I make the decision because I don’t believe I can win two matches