Rafael Nadal defied his dad’s instructions during Wimbledon quarter-final win over Taylor Fritz

Rafael Nadal defied his family’s wishes by battling through injury to record a remarkable five-set victory over Taylor Fritz – but gave no guarantees he will take to Centre Court for his semi-final against Nick Kyrgios.

Nadal came into the match with an abdominal problem and looked set to retire at a couple of moments but somehow recovered to claim a 3-6 7-5 3-6 7-5 7-6 (4) victory after four hours and 20 minutes.

The Spaniard’s father Sebastian gestured to his son to call it a day when he went off for treatment midway through the second set, and Nadal shook his head towards his box after losing the third, with Fritz seemingly waiting for a handshake.

<p lang=«en» dir=«ltr» xml:lang=«en»>Sebastian Nadal telling his son Rafael to quit? #Wimbledon #Nadal pic.twitter.com/L0LiJQQttY

‘They told me I need to retire the match, yes,” said Nadal. “For me it was tough to retire in the middle of the match. Not easy even if I had that idea for such a long time. It’s something that I hate to do. So I just kept trying, and that’s it.’

The result kept alive Nadal’s hopes of becoming the first man since Rod Laver in 1969 to win all four grand slam titles in the same year, but much will depend on how he recovers over the next couple of days.

‘Tomorrow I’m going to have some more tests,’ he said. ‘But it’s difficult to know. I am used to having things and I am used to holding pain and to play with problems. Knowing that, when I feel something like I felt, that is because something is not going the proper way in the abdominal.

‘I had these feelings for a couple of days. Without a doubt, today was the worst day. It has been an important increase of pain and limitation.

‘Nothing can be fixed when you have a thing like this. I’m proud about the