I almost lost my ball

By Richard Pagliaro | @Tennis_Now | Friday, October 18, 2024
Photo credit: Clive Brunskill/Getty

“New balls please” was once an ATP slogan.

Recently it was a very scary possibility for Andrey Rublev.

More: Rafael Nadal announces his retirement from tennis

Speaking to the media at the Stockholm Open, Rublev shared the health scare he suffered following a physical five-set defeat to Grigor Dimitrov last month.

In every male athlete’s worst nightmare, Rublev suffered testicular trauma.

Or as Rublev put it bluntly: “I almost lost my ball.”

The reigning Madrid champion felt pain in his testicles after losing the US Open in five sets.

Fortunately, Rublev went to the hospital for treatment, where he faced a terrible prospect: a testicular amputation.

“Now I feel perfect, everything went well,” Rublev told the media in Stockholm. “I don’t know what to call it smart, but I can call it funny.”

“I almost lost my ball. I was very lucky because they say you only have five or six hours before the blood stops flowing and then amputation occurs. I was lucky. I don’t know why I said, ‘Let’s go to the hospital.’ just to find out why I have a strange feeling.

“They immediately looked into it and took me in for surgery as an emergency, and then they were able to do the surgery within three or four hours of when I first felt it. So they were able to do everything well and in the end everything is great.”

Rublev, ranked No. 7 in the world, now has the spring in his step again but shared that it is almost a whole new game.

The last memory Rublev had before anesthesia began was signing a discharge form that allowed doctors to perform a testicular amputation if necessary.

“The last thing before they let me sleep was that I signed the paper that they could amputate my ball,” Rublev recalled. “That was the last thing I saw before the operation.”

39-year-old Stan Wawrinka beat top seed Rublev 7-6, 7-6 from the Stockholm Open today to reach the oldest semi-final in tournament history.

Nevertheless, Rublev is relieved to be physically and mentally intact again on the pitch.