"Felt pain playing in the match, & I don't want for it to get worse" - Stefanos Tsitsipas after retiring with arm injury at Paris Masters
Stefanos Tsitsipas' 2021 Paris Masters campaign came to an abrupt end as he had to retire while 4-2 down in the first set against Alexei Popyrin. During his press conference after the match, Tsitsipas elaborated a little on the arm injury that forced him to quit.
Get well soon, @steftsitsipas 🙏
The No.3 seed is forced to retire down 4-2 in his match against Alexei Popyrin
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The 23-year-old first stated that he had never retired during a match before, but had no option on Wednesday. He went on to claim that the withdrawal was more of a precaution than anything else, since he wants to be fully fit for the upcoming ATP Finals.
"I haven't retired once in my life, and it was something that I had to do today," Tsitsipas said. "I'm trying to be precautious for the next tournaments, which is the most important one for me."
Tsitsipas also revealed that his arm has been bothering him for quite some time now, and that the situation has gotten worse recently. He started to feel some pain while playing against Popyrin, and didn't want to make the situation even worse.
"My arm has been -- I have had an issue there for quite a while now," the Greek added. "It has gotten bigger in the last couple of weeks, so I'm just trying to protect it. I felt the pain playing in the match, and I just don't want for it to get worse than it is now."
Stefanos Tsitsipas' next course of action is to get the injury treated by the best experts
Elaborating on his rehab plans, Stefanos Tsitsipas stated that he's aware of what needs to be done to become fully fit again - and that practicing daily is not one of those things. He also admitted he is finding it difficult to cope with the situation as he's unable to play in important tournaments like the Paris Masters because of it.
"Well, I know how to treat it, but playing for every day, going out on the court practicing doesn't make it better," Tsitsipas said. "So you know, it's not easy to just stop, especially when you have important tournaments like this one here that I really want to do well and play well."
The Greek has set the bar quite high with his performances this year, and he expressed disappointment that he's unable to play at the level everyone expects him to. Tsitsipas' focus is now solely on becoming completely healthy by getting the best possible treatment from the very best people in the field.
"It hurts a lot not to be able to play at the level that I'm expected to play, and I'm expecting myself to play," the 23-year-old added. "I'm going to have treatments. I'm going to try and have the best people treat me, and give me the best advice. Anything possible to recover and be 100% again."
When asked to describe exactly what was bothering him in the arm, Stefanos Tsitsipas chose to keep mum since he likes to keep such matters private.
"Sorry, I prefer not to share these kind of details," he said. "I prefer to keep it personal."