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Rafael Nadal loses to David Ferrer in Australian Open quarterfinals

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MELBOURNE, Australia — Rafael Nadal’s bid to win four straight Grand Slam tournaments is over.

The injured Nadal lost for the second straight year in the Australian Open quarterfinals, going down 6-4, 6-2, 6-3 Wednesday to fellow Spaniard David Ferrer.

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Nadal, who appeared to have tears in his eyes during a changeover while trailing 3-0 in the third set, took a medical timeout for an apparent leg injury after three games. He was clearly out of sorts, failing to chase down balls that he would ordinarily return easily.

‘This is a difficult day for me,’ Nadal said. ‘Today I can’t do more than what I did; he played at a very high level.’

Nadal, who didn’t bother chasing the winner on match point, won last year’s French Open, Wimbledon and U.S. Open. He was trying to add the Australian title and hold all four major trophies, which hasn’t been achieved since Rod Laver won four in a row in 1969.

When pressed about the injury, Nadal said: ‘I don’t have to tell you what I felt on the court, but it is obvious I did not feel at my best. I had a problem with the match at the very beginning, and after that, the match was almost over.’

Last year, he retired against Andy Murray because of a right knee ailment that kept him off the tour for two months, again on the Australia Day national holiday.

Nadal picked up a virus two weeks ago in Doha at the start of the year, and sweated profusely in several of his matches. He didn’t want to elaborate on his injury, saying he didn’t want to use injuries as an excuse.

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‘In general, I had a virus. When you have a virus, your body goes down and you have more risk of everything,’ he said. ‘That’s probably what happened. That’s the simple thing.’

The fireworks that would have lighted up the tennis world had Nadal won his fourth in a row came Wednesday night during the match -- Australia Day celebrations forced a 10-minute interruption for a pyrotechnics show in the sky outside Rod Laver Arena.

As the fireworks exploded, Nadal changed his shirt and briefly left the stadium. He came back a couple of minutes later and took off his right shoe and rubbed his toes and sock.

After losing the second set, the usually fidgety Nadal slumped in his chair at the changeover, completely still with his head bent.

The crowd cheered almost exclusively for Nadal -- ‘Come on, Rafa’ -- while often applauding Ferrer’s errors.

‘This is one big victory for me, but it’s not like a victory really,’ seventh-seeded Ferrer said on court after the match. ‘He was playing with injury ... and I had luck. But I played my game.’

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Murray won’t have to get past Nadal this year, but he will have to beat Ferrer and either defending champion Roger Federer or 2008 champion Novak Djokovic to claim his first major title. He advanced Wednesday with a 7-5, 6-3, 6-7 (3), 6-3 win over unseeded Alexandr Dolgopolov.

-- Associated Press

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