Back home, Rafael Nadal is looking to pick up where he left off before being sidelined by an injury that halted a strong start to the year.

Nadal will seek his fourth title of the season this week at the Madrid Open as he returns to action after a stress fracture to his ribs which kept him out of action for around a month.

Nadal had won his first 20 games of the year before suffering an injury in the semi-finals at Indian Wells. He reached the final but lost to Taylor Fritz for his first loss. Until then, it was the third best start to the season on the ATP Tour since 1990.

Nadal won the Australian Open for a record 21st Grand Slam title and also won in Melbourne and Acapulco. He missed tournaments in Miami, Monte Carlo and Barcelona due to his injury.

The 35-year-old Spaniard will be looking to win the Madrid title for the sixth time, and the first since 2017, although he said last week he would have “little chance” of winning after arriving “with minimal of preparation”.

He will make his debut against Miomir Kecmanovic or Alexander Bublik.

Nadal could face a semi-final against top-ranked Novak Djokovic, who is trying to regain his best form after a slow start to the season.

A three-time winner in Madrid, Djokovic had just finished second in Serbia, where he won three matches in straight sets before losing the final to Andrey Rublev.

His first game in Madrid will be against Gaël Monfils or Carlos Gimeno Valero.

Another favorite of the Madrid crowd will be sensational youngster Carlos Alcaraz, who rose to No. 9 in the world after titles in Rio de Janeiro, Miami and Barcelona.

The 18-year-old, presented by many as Nadal’s heir, could face his idol in the quarter-finals. He lost to Nadal in the second round of the tournament last year.

Alcaraz will start their campaign against Nikoloz Basilashvili or Fabio Fognini.

Former world number 1 Andy Murray, a two-time winner in Madrid, will return to the clay-court tournament for the first time since 2017. He will face a first-round match under the marquee against former world number 3 Dominic Thiem, runner-up at twice in the Spanish capital.

Thiem is recovering from a wrist injury that sidelined him for eight months.

Murray, 34, had earlier announced he would skip the clay-court season but ended up accepting the invitation to play in Spain.