French Open 2018: Rafael Nadal and David Goffin both criticise Roland Garros
GETTY David Goffin was slipping on court - as was Rafael Nadal
Nadal spent just over three hours on court as he beat Simone Bolelli in a first-round match that stretched over two days thanks to a rain delay. The pair played on through the conditions initially before competition organisers finally pushed the match back to Tuesday for its conclusion. But Nadal would not blame the weather for the difficult conditions, instead claiming there was less clay on the court itself.
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“The court is more slippery than usual, and actually, I slid a lot when I started off or when I moved to another side, and it was quite complicated. There are no excuses. This is what I felt,” Nadal said. “If you look at the images on television, you can see that there are many more greyer zones or whiter zones than other years, because there are little pebbles underneath, and that's why you don't have the proper grip on the court.” The clay courts have between one and two millimetres of red brick dust which acts as the top surface covering about seven centimetres of crushed white limestone: the grey and white areas Nadal mentions.