Juan Martín del Potro published an emotional video on his Instagram account this Monday in which he recounts the ordeal he has suffered due to knee injuries that have made him say goodbye to tennis early. A goodbye that will take place this December 1 during an exhibition with Novak Djokovic in Buenos Aires.
Although his goodbye took place in the 2022 Buenos Aires tournament after losing to Delbonis, ‘Delpo’ assures that, after that match, he had to undergo another operation. “When I played the last game with Delbonis, people didn’t know this and I never told it, but the next day I took a plane to Switzerland and had surgery on my knee again. That was my fifth surgery. From then on I never made my surgeries public again because in the press conference prior to my match with Federico I said that it was possibly my last match. There I found a little peace and broke with something that constantly happened to me, which was ‘Delpo, when are you playing again? When do I see you again at a tournament?’ I couldn’t take it anymore because of the pain in my legs. I thought I had to do this in a low profile, in secret, and if it works, I’ll make an announcement that I’m really coming back.”
An intervention that reflects all the operations that Del Potro had to undergo to treat this pain in his knee. “I went to Switzerland, I was there for two months, locked up in a town near Basel, they operated on me, I did rehabilitation and it didn’t work and after two and a half months they told me ‘We have one more thing left, we have to operate on you again.’ The sixth operation. Then I went to the United States, I continued with the rehabilitation, and between surgeries I tried treatments. I must have had more than 100 injections in my leg, hip and back. They infiltrated me, took my blood, analyzed me, burned my nerves, blocked my tendons… It is a suffering that I have daily. This is how I come from that last day with Federico and until today, counting the two years prior to the day of my injury. The match was to say ‘Goodbye, tennis, this is not going to go any further’. I’m no longer excited to play because my body doesn’t allow it.”
Some problems that derive from the first knee operation that Del Potro underwent, which ended up becoming an endless nightmare. “When I had surgery the first time, the doctor told me: ‘In three months you will be playing again.’ This was in 2019 and I signed up for the tournaments in Stockholm, Basel and Paris because the doctor told me that I was fine to play. And from that first operation until today I have never been able to climb a staircase without pain. On a trip to Tandil I have to stop halfway to stretch my legs. My legs hurt many times when I sleep, when I turn on my side I wake up because I get some punctures that are very ugly. This is an endless nightmare and every day I try to find a solution, looking for doctors, alternatives and I still can’t find them. “It all started in that first operation, and every time I think about it, I get emotional because it makes me very angry, anguished, helpless, but I can’t change this.”
In the video, ‘la Torre de Tandil’ also explained why he has decided to make this video about his ordeal public now.. “I feel like I have to tell you how I am because I always had a connection with the public and maybe this message can inspire and help other people. My daily life is not what I want. He was a very active guy who really liked playing sports, not just playing tennis, and suddenly they invite you to play soccer and I’m the one who carries the mate and sits outside, or they go play paddle tennis and I record the videos, and for me it is terrible. On a sporting level, they took away my hope of doing what I always liked to do, which was playing tennis. It is very difficult to have to ‘care’ everything 24 hours a day, it is very complicated and there are times when I don’t feel like it anymore. I am not indestructible, I am like any person who has their good things and their bad things but I have that plus that I have to put on a good face in certain situations and I have no energy. The leg thing consumes me a lot, it consumes me emotionally, because not only am I in that search to improve, but I also suffer every day. I get up and take between 6 and 8 pills: a gastric protector, an anti-inflammatory, an analgesic, one for inflammation, one for anxiety… They tell me to lose weight but the medication makes me gain weight, not to eat sugar nor flour… What does that have to do with my knee? I thought 95 kilos and it hurt me to climb the stairs. And all those things that doctors tell you and other people who come in to tell you that they have such a machine, and I have tried it.”
‘Delpo’ realized the numerous problems he has had to overcome in his career but knee injuries have slowed him down to the extreme. “One thing is the stones that can appear along the way, such as injuries, which for an athlete is the most complicated thing, and another thing is emotional pain. I felt very powerful and very strong when it came to facing those stones that appeared to me and that I always beat him within reason. I was strong but at the end of the day I realize that I am not that strong. Because with the knee, I feel like he beat me. I had surgery eight times with doctors all over the world, spending a fortune. Every time they gave me anesthesia I felt that the operation was going well and that it was not going to hurt anymore and that I was going to go around the dam in Tandil without pain and after 2-3 months I called the doctor again to tell him : ‘This didn’t work, I’m the same as always.’”
Among the various solutions to his knee problem, Del Potro was given injections to numb his nerves, but without success. “They put a 30-40 centimeter needle in the middle of my femur in order to block nerves without anesthesia because the doctor had to know if he had given me a good block.” or not according to what I felt and I couldn’t anesthetize myself. And I was screaming and jumping on the stretchers suffering from that pain so he would tell me ‘Try, this one worked’ and I would do ‘tock’, and say ‘it hurts’. And so on and on.”
Del Potro’s situation was such that the tennis player was offered a prosthesis, although many advised against it. “You think the problem is psychological, you don’t know why you’re involved in this and, sometimes, you can’t stand it anymore. It’s terrible because I have another big fight with the doctors who tell me ‘put on a prosthesis and stop fucking around’. And I say: ‘Okay, what does the prosthesis guarantee me?’ And they tell me that I will have a better quality of life. And that’s what I’m looking for, I’m no longer looking for whether to run, play tennis or play a game with my friends. But then someone else comes and tells me that I am too young for the prosthesis. Wait until you’re 50. And I say: ‘Skinny, since I was 31 I haven’t run, I haven’t climbed a ladder, I can’t kick a ball, I haven’t played tennis anymore… am I going to have 15 years of my life like this so that at 50 they put me on a prosthesis and live? more or less okay at 60?’ Now I’m in that discussion. And it’s also terrible, because they tell you: ‘These are the scenarios, you decide.’ And why did I have to make that decision if the doctor is you, who told me some time ago ‘you have this injury, do this’ and I was so convinced. Why do I have to decide now? “I’m involved in it and I hope one day it ends because I want to live without pain.”
A Delpo who, next Sunday, will see the light among so many nightmares with this exhibition against Djokovic in which he intends to say goodbye to tennis. “I started the diet again, I lost weight, I started training. I want to be as fit and best as possible. It is an event to say goodbye. There is no more turning back and the final touch is given by Djokovic, who was very generous in accepting it and being able to come. Beyond my personal moment, together with people, I owe him a lot of love, May he take with him the best memory of Argentina and its Argentine fans. And if I can have a little peace in my leg for one, two or three hours and enjoy a tennis court for the last time it would be very nice. And to be able to give back from within and with Djokovic a beautiful moment of so much love and affection and that they take away good memories of that night.”
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