Rafael Nadal is no stranger to being out of action for months due to injuries taking a toll on his body but when the Spaniard pulled out from a virtual reality tennis match that would have been contested using a game console - it raised a few eyebrows. The claycourt king had been expected to take on gamer DjMariio as part of a virtual Madrid Open charity event - but ended up being a no show on Monday.
With professional tennis tours closed down until mid July at the earliest because of the coronavirus pandemic, an esports version of the claycourt event is being staged online. Nadal showed impressive fingerwork to beat young Canadian Denis Shapovalov in his opening round-robin match on a digital representation of the Spanish capital's Manolo Santana Stadium.
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