World No.1 Rafael Nadal has admitted that the Australian Open final, which he lost to Switzerland's Stanislas Wawrinka, was 'the worst hour and a half' he ever spent on a tennis court.
Wawrinka won his first major title by beating Nadal 6-3, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 in the Australian Open final on January 26 and ending the Spaniard's hopes of becoming the first man in the Open Era - which began in the late 1960s - to win each of tennis' four biggest titles at least twice.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald, the 13-time Grand Slam champion, who sustained a back injury in the final of the year's first Grand Slam tournament, said that he has not yet got over his Melbourne performance, adding that it was the worst hour and a half that he had spent on a tennis court.
Stating that he had not intended to retire even though he knew that he had no chance of winning the tournament, Nadal also said that it had been a bit harder to recover from the loss in Melbourne than from other defeats even though he is a person who takes his losses very well.
Nadal also said that he planned to return to Davis Cup action to try to help keep Spain in the World Group of tennis' premier international team competition, although he added that he planned to play in the tournament if he remained healthy.