Tennis legend Rafael Nadal feels his Barcelona title will help him prepare for longer battles ahead of the European Clay season. Nadal had to battle hard for his record 12th Barcelona title as he defeated Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas by 6.4, 6-7, 7-5 after gruelling three hours and 37 minutes.

In fact, Nadal has been on the sidelines after losing the Australian Open quarter finals against Stefanos Tsitsipas and thus also got his revenge. However, Nadal believes matches like the Barcelona final will help him prepare for longer battles and it will be helpful for his body to get acclimatized for tougher upcoming challenges.

Nadal hasn’t played a lot of Tennis in the recent past and he will look to hit the ground running in the coming tournaments.

“I haven’t been able to play a lot of competitive matches for the past couple of months. It’s true that matches like today make me feel better physically and more ready for long battles,” Nadal told reporters. 

“I think I’ve been able to play better and better during the whole week in every single match and today was a bit better than yesterday. I have room to keep improving. I wasn’t perfect. “I really believe I can play better than what I’m doing on clay and I hope that the victory is going to help me to raise my level a little bit that I need to fight for the next couple of events that I’m going to play.”

Nadal has all the experience under his belt and he will aim to bring his best to the table in the upcoming tournaments. The lefty will be next seen in action in the Madrid Open, which will begin in early May and he will look to continue his domination on clay.