The start of the clay-court season brought more injury trouble for Jack Draper as the Briton was forced to retire from his opening match at the Barcelona Open.
The British No2 left the court with his right knee strapped up while 4-1 down in the deciding set against Tomás Martín Etcheverry.
After withdrawing from last week’s Monte Carlo Masters, Draper delayed the beginning of his clay-court season until Monday’s match.
Draper, who was the tournament’s No8 seed, made a promising start against his Argentine opponent, winning the first set 6-3. However, he lost the second by the same scoreline and had been broken twice in the third set, when he retired.
It became clear that Draper was troubled by the pain in his knee at the start of the second set, when Etcheverry, the world No29, began to dominate. Draper received treatment between the second and third sets after calling for a medical timeout but retired five games later.
Draper is now the world No27 having fallen down the rankings from a career high of No4 when he took time out to recuperate a shoulder injury late last year. He sat out for almost six months, from September until February, with bone bruising in his dominant left arm.
Draper is next scheduled to play at the Madrid Open later this monthShutterstock Editorial
The 24-year-old has had mixed results since his return this year. After registering an impressive victory over Novak Djokovic in the fourth round at Indian Wells, he suffered a disappointing second-round defeat by Reilly Opelka in the Miami Open before admitting that he was “still in the very early stages of coming back from what was a very difficult injury”.
He will hope this latest concern does not stop him from competing at the Madrid Open, which begins on April 20. His performance there will be crucial for his world ranking as he will be defending 650 ranking points, more than a third of his total points, having reached the final last year.
Meanwhile, Cameron Norrie came out on top in a gruelling contest against the veteran wild card Stan Wawrinka in what was the Swiss player’s final outing in Barcelona.
Norrie broke the 41-year-old’s serve twice to win the first set and, after breaking once more to go 5-4 up in the second, it should have been an easy task to finish the job.
However, Wawrinka fought valiantly and broke straight back, with the Briton committing a double fault to lose the game. He did the same again during a thrilling tie-break to let his resurgent opponent even up the contest.
Norrie taken the distance by Wawrinka, the 41-year-old veteranJavier Borrego/Europa Press via Getty Images
The British No1 was still up against it in the final set as the contest moved into its third hour, but he was able to overcome two Wawrinka break points to win 6-4, 6-7 (5-7), 6-4 and move into the last 16.
On Wednesday he will face the American Ethan Quinn, who reached a career-high ranking of world No50 after beating Opelka in straight sets on Monday.