Rafael Nadal opened up on his relationship with Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic after they spent almost two decades locked in a heated rivalry. The Big Three faced off on the sport’s grandest stages with the biggest titles on the line. Between them, they have won 66 Grand Slam titles.
The Spaniard officially retired at last year’s Davis Cup, leaving Djokovic as the last active player of the Big Three. Four months after ending his career, Nadal gave a rare insight into how he truly feels about his greatest rivals and explained what he wanted the next generation of tennis players to learn from their years of competition.
During their era of dominance, Nadal, Federer, and Djokovic took tennis to new heights. Not only did they break records and rewrite history, but their rivalries brought new eyes to the game and will go down as three of the greatest rivalries in all of sports.
By the time he retired in November, Nadal had faced Djokovic a staggering 60 times and played 40 matches against Federer. After years of intense battles, each of them would be forgiven if they had a frosty relationship.
But the 14-time French Open champion has now explained how the three always had “respect” for one another and saw each other as humans away from the court, rather than “hating” each other.
“I think we as rivals showed the world that we can be the biggest rivals, but at the same time, we can be colleagues,” Nadal said while appearing on Andy Roddick’s Served podcast.
“I mean, I don’t say best friends, but we can have a good personal relationship, you know?
“And I think that shows a positive example to the next generations. I am proud of that. You know, we grow this with this, I mean, in some way, wild rivalry that we had between Roger, Novak, myself.
“But at the same time, we were able to not lose the perspective that we are human people. We don’t fight against each other. I mean, we respect each other.”
The 38-year-old is hoping young players can follow in their footsteps and form friendly relationships while maintaining fierce competition on the court.He continued: “I think that helps these new generations to understand that you don’t need to hate the opponents. You can respect, you can appreciate the opponent, because at the end, they are an important part of your lives.
And you don’t need to hate the opponents to give your best. That’s what I think we showed the world.”Nadal already believes there are some younger champions who have adopted a similar mentality. “I think Carlos [Alcaraz] is a great kid, a great guy, with a very good family behind him, with positive values. They are humble, they are good people. That’s true,” he added.
“And that’s why I think Carlos is how he is. Because at the end, the values you receive at home, the way that you are educated then is the way that you show up. And I see the same with Iga [Swiatek].
“I think Jannik [Sinner] is another good guy, not much showing off, focusing on what he’s doing. Of course, he went through a very, very tough process the last year.
“He’s amazing the way that he was able to keep being focused on what he’s doing. But I think it’s a new generation of great tennis players there, and I think they’re going to keep helping this beautiful sport to grow and to engage fans.”
