Rafael Nadal will play Botic van de Zandschulp in a singles match as Spain face the Netherlands on Tuesday in the Davis Cup finals – the 22-time Grand Slam champion’s last event before he retires.
The lineups for both countries were announced about an hour before their quarter-final was scheduled to begin on the first day of competition on an indoor hard court at the sold-out Palacio de Deportes Jose Maria Martin Carpena in southern Spain.
THIS. IS. NOT. A. DRILL 🔥
Rafael Nadal will face Botic van de Zandschulp in the opening match between Spain and Netherlands!#DavisCup #GraciasRafa pic.twitter.com/n7LXDSdehA
— Davis Cup (@DavisCup) November 19, 2024
The 38-year-old Nadal will face 80th-ranked Van de Zandschulp in the opening singles match, before Carlos Alcaraz goes up against No. 40 Tallon Griekspoor of the Netherlands. Nadal has won 29 Davis Cup singles matches in a row.
Nadal has played only seven tournaments all year as he struggled with injuries and illness. The match against van de Zandschulp — who upset Alcaraz at the U.S. Open — will be Nadal’s first outing since early August at the Paris Olympics, where he lost in the second round of singles to Novak Djokovic and bowed out in the doubles quarterfinals alongside Alcaraz.
If the best-of-three-match series is tied at 1-1 after the singles, Alcaraz and Marcel Granollers will meet Van de Zandschulp and Wesley Koolhof in a doubles match to determine which team advances to the semi-finals.
The winners will play either Canada or Germany on Friday, with the final taking place on Sunday.
