He had said goodbye in February, in his country, at the ATP 250 tournament in Buenos Aires.
Juan Martin del Potro, a former world No.3 and one of the most talented players of the past two decades, never managed to recover from a knee injury suffered in June 2019. After several operations and missed comebacks , he had finally preferred to say stop, he whose career will have been more than marred by injuries.
In the Argentinian newspaper La Nacion, he shared the difficulties of his daily life due to the consequences of his operations: "
Today I can only walk, I do not run, not even on carpet, I am unable to climb the stairs without pain. , and I can't drive too long without needing to stretch out the pain.
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Heartbreaking confessions, which the Argentinian tries to face with courage and lucidity.
"
It's my reality, it's very hard, very sad, but I'm looking for the best way to improve myself, my new challenge is to find how to digest all this, to assimilate what happens to me and the way I get up every morning to live as well as possible.
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Winner of the US Open in 2009 as an individual and the Davis Cup in 2016 with his country, del Potro also speaks of the impact on his mental health: “
My head cannot accept a life without tennis.
I just didn't have a smooth transition.
I haven't been able to prepare for retirement and I have no idea what other players who go through this process are doing.
I was number three in the world.
Then suddenly both of my knees broke.
And here I am, with nothing
.
Not all retirements can look like Roger Federer's.