Nifty Nadal unfazed by video-game glitches

MADRID • Clay-court king Rafa Nadal suffered a fake injury, several players "froze" and one match vanished into thin air, as the Virtual Madrid Open made its debut on Monday.

With professional tennis tours halted until mid-July at the earliest because of the coronavirus pandemic, an e-sports version of the clay-court event is being staged online. Thirty-two of the world's best players have swopped their rackets for PlayStation controllers to contest the four-day event broadcast live on Facebook Gaming.

While things did not start very well as the game appeared to malfunction, Nadal showed impressive fingerwork to beat Canadian Denis Shapovalov in his opening round-robin match on a digital representation of the Spanish capital's Manolo Santana Stadium.

Nadal, a five-time champion of the real Madrid Open that should have been played this week, later pulled out of his exhibition match against YouTube star DjMaRiiO. The 33-year-old warrior was said to have tweaked his back.

Fellow Spaniard Feliciano Lopez, director of the tournament which is raising funds to help lower-ranked pros, later confessed it was a prank.

"Guys, I was joking, of course..." he said. "I said Rafa had a back injury from the pressure of playing on the PS4. We might need some sense of humour please!"

Online fans moaned about the long gaps between matches, played on the Tennis World Tour game and each lasting about 15 minutes.

The duel between Donna Vekic and Angelique Kerber was lost in cyberspace - presumably because of Wi-Fi issues.

Still, it was an entertaining day.

Swiss world No. 8 Belinda Bencic staged a "walk-on" to the tune of I Love Rock 'N' Roll, emerging from up her stairs in full tennis kit before taking her PlayStation controller out of her racket bag and polishing off Spain's Carla Suarez Navarro.

Andy Murray grunted loudly after every virtual shot and provided in-game commentary as he beat Benoit Paire.

During one point, the Frenchman came to the net and hit a backhand winner. "I've never seen you play that shot before, ever," the Scot said. "Normally you hit a drop shot there!"

REUTERS