Rafael Nadal embellished his Grand Slam record with a first-round win against the Argentine Francisco Cerundolo. It was his 306th career victory in a Grand Slam, tying the great Martina Navratilova at fourth place on the all-time list. Playing his first match on grass since 2019, the Mallorcan master wasn’t at his convincing best, especially during a 90-minute period when Cerundolo was striking as sweetly as ever. The Argentine had troubled the Spaniard throughout the first two sets, but Nadal’s doggedness saw him through on both occasions. But in the third and halfway through the fourth, the Buenos Aires resident kept working away at the Nadal armoury to work himself back into the tie.

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4-2 ahead in the fourth, Cerundolo had a shot at a double break but would squander an easy winner. It was enough for Nadal to turn the screws. Given a reprieve, he adroitly held serve before conjuring a break on the Argentine’s serve. Sensing the kill, Rafa blunted whatever remained of the Cerundolo charge to seal a memorable return to Centre Court. Speaking after the match, Nadal alluded to his ring-rustiness:

“It’s not a surface that we play very often, and especially in my case, for different reasons, as I said the past three years I didn’t put any foot on a grass court, so it always takes a while,” quotes TennisWorld USA.

Without much grass-court tennis under his belt, the 36-year-old would go on to admit that the opening encounter was one test among many:

“It was my first match and as I know, every day is a test and today was one of these important tests. I know at the beginning of the tournament especially, under the circumstances that I arrived here, the victory is the most important thing because that gives me the chance to practise tomorrow again and to have another match in two days.”

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Navratilova was one of the first to congratulate Nadal on reaching this milestone. Taking to Twitter, the 65-year-old wrote:

“Congrats Rafa, and you are not done yet.”

The 22-time Grand Slam champion now stands behind Novak Djokovic, Serena Williams and Roger Federer on the all-time list.