The viral photo of Rafa Nadal and Novak Djokovic on the plane: how they met and where they traveled

There are 46 Grand Slam tournaments summarized in a single photo. The protagonists Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal They coincided on a flight from Spain to the United States, blew up the nets and left an emblematic image in the world of tennis.

What were the chances of this happening? Not many, given that both are headed to different destinations: Nole, headed to the Masters 1000 in Indian Wells and Miami; Rafa in Las Vegas, to perform with the great Carlos Alcaraz for the audiovisual platform Netflix, which will be broadcast on March 3; both will play a match that has been promoted as “The Netflix Slam”.

Both were great rivals, but the recognition of each other’s talent is undeniable. Nadal did not hesitate to recognize this in an interview: “I would say it’s the best in history. He had a better body than me and that counts too. The numbers say that yes, it is the best and for me it is.”. Nole surpassed the Spaniard with 24 Grand Slam titles out of 22.

The 36-year-old Serbian returns to this tournament after several seasons without participation due to refusal of the coronavirus vaccine, which caused him several obstacles in his competitive years.

The special moment transcends the future of both of them. On the side of the biggest winner, he will return to the ring later in the year after being a semi-finalist in the Australian Open, when he fell to Jannik Sinner, who ended up being the champion of the tournament. And for Rafa, the desire to return to the pitch puts him in rhythm in 2024 with this great match that he will play against the second team in the world, even if the context is not competitive. This will help him find his rhythm again, and give him revenge after his approach to tournaments when he participated in Brisbane, which he had to abandon due to a new injury.

On the other hand, one of the representatives of the Argentine team did not let the emotion of the emblematic photo go away. “Is there room there?” he commented. Tomas Etcheverry, who is currently recovering from an injury that forced him to withdraw from the Argentina Open.