This is Sumit Nagal’s description of his 2021 season. In the weeks following his first Grand Slam win at the US Open, he was granted a wildcard to the Australian Open main draw. It ended with him lying on the hospital bed for hip surgery.
Nagal is doing light exercises and using crutches after his procedure a couple of months ago. He’s also walking without assistance and using crutches to get on his feet as he recovers in Bengaluru with physio Yash Pandey. The last time he played competitive tennis was in October; he won’t be able to play again for at least three more months. Nagal plans to take it easy, but hopes to be back on court in 3-4 weeks after returning to Germany.
From Bengaluru, Nagal, 24, said, “It’s getting boring.”. “I’ve been away from the court for quite a while.”. “I want to play tennis again.”
Last year was an exciting roller coaster ride. The wild card for the Australian Open added to the excitement. It was his first Grand Slam victory in seven years and he was close to breaking into the top-100 in the rankings. Nagal lost in the first round in Melbourne but made a quarter-final run at the Buenos Aires ATP 250 tournament in March, in the process beating a top-25 player for the first time.
The rest of the season, Nagal had 10 opening round exits.
‘It was a funny year, with good matches and bad matches,’ he said. There were different levels of pain experienced by Nagal during his on-court battles. In Australia, an MRI revealed a hip injury. While he continued to play, he sought medical advice and tried a variety of rehabilitation programs.
The pain wouldn’t go away, nothing worked. The injury reached its peak for Nagal midseason. As soon as he moved to his forehand side or tried to serve, his hip protested. There were “really bad days” there, a period which saw him lose more than win, even on his preferred clay surface. It included losing to a lower-ranked player in the French Open qualifiers.
“Oh man, it wasn’t easy,” Nagal said. My mental state was not good on the court. I would just say, “Why me?“, trying to come up with an excuse to get out of it. It took a lot of sessions with my mental trainer and plenty of chat sessions with my team to make me realize “it’s okay, you can get out of this, you can still achieve things.”.
A rare shot of positivity was Nagal’s last-minute entry at the Tokyo Olympics after many withdrawals, and his win before losing to Daniil Medvedev in the second round. “As soon as I woke up to that email (about Tokyo), I will never forget it.”, he said.
After losing to a player almost 100 spots below him in the US Open qualifiers, he shifted to playing on softer clay courts. He was unable to play on hard courts due to an ailing hip. In September, when he was scheduled to play Finland on hard courts indoors, he withdrew from the Davis Cup tie. Indian tennis officials weren’t happy with Nagal’s decision to play on the Challenger tour without competing in Davis Cup. However, Nagal chose not to listen to them.
Nagal tried a number of things in an effort to improve his hip condition on the run before deciding to have surgery.
Nagal ended the season early after a Challenger in Sibiu, Romania, where he had the best result of the year, a semi-final. He couldn’t return to the United States right away because of the surgery he had scheduled in Germany. While biking through Paltinis, a mountainous region near Sibiu, he decided to relax.
Nagal said, “I was in a different mental zone.” Nagal had not been home for 19 months. He had missed his family and friends. So he stayed in Romania for a few extra days with one of his best friends, and they did some stuff together-bike rides and little walks. It was a nice experience for him.
In April, he hopes to return to the Tour, and he plans to be in top shape for the Asian Games. With his ranking falling from 137 to 222, Nagal has lost ground as India’s top singles player. Nagal is confident of an upswing again when he returns to the league with his protected ranking.
“I just want to come back to the tennis court and play some matches again. I know if I am healthy, I can play at a very high level as I have proved a few times. I believe that once I am back, I can climb even higher.”
The hip surgery has left Sumit Nagal eager to start ag
