Fans boo shirtless Rafa Nadal in Australian Open loss
Bad: Rafael Nadal lost the Australian Open final to Stan Wawrinka. Worse: He got booed, too.
Listen to the reaction from the crowd when #Nadal returns to court - http://t.co/ViRP79hoay #ausopen
— Australian Open (@AustralianOpen) January 26, 2014 Context from the AP:
A possible retirement was looming when Nadal was serving at 0-2 in the second set. He bent over at the waist to stretch his back and then grabbed his lower back with his hand and grimaced in pain.
His serve immediately dipped to 141 kph (87 mph). When Nadal took a medical timeout after falling behind a set and a break, and returned to a chorus of boos without a shirt after 7 minutes, it seemed that an early finish was on the cards.
Wawrinka was aggravated during the time out, demanding that officials tell him why Nadal needed the break. And he came out aggressively to finish off the second set.
After the match, Rafa was all class.
#Nadal "This is not the moment to talk about the back. This is Stan's day not my day. I'm disappointed. Sad about wht happened. A tough one"
— Australian Open (@AustralianOpen) January 26, 2014 #Nadal "Crowd wants to watch best match possible & I was not able to do that for them. I understand the reaction. They understood later."
— Australian Open (@AustralianOpen) January 26, 2014 So no hard feelings. But Nadal still lost to Wawrinka for the first time in 13 career meetings. Dang.
(Gif via @cjzero)
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