I'm very pessimistic that the circuit can resume normal activity soon, says tennis star Rafael Nadal

Professional tennis has been suspended until the end of July over the coronavirus pandemic that taken the sporting world by storm.

Tennis superstar Rafael Nadal is pessimistic that the sport will be returning any time soon as the world continues to register more coronavirus infections daily.

 "From my point of view, I'm very pessimistic that the circuit can resume normal activity. In tennis, you need to travel every week, stay in hotels, go to different countries.

"Even if we play without an audience, to organise any event you need a lot of people involved, which cannot be ignored. At an international level, I see a serious problem,” Nadal said in an online chat organised by the Spanish Tennis Federation on Sunday.

Covid-19 has led to a complete shutdown of major sports events including the postponement of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, which includes tennis, and the cancellation of Wimbledon.

French Open organisers have rescheduled that event for the end of September, shortly after the US Open.

The world number two star pointed out that health is more important to athletes than tennis tournaments.

"We have already said many times we are in a very difficult moment, for everyone.

"Step-by-step it looks like things are slightly less bad, but we've been through one and a half very tough months, lots of irreparable losses and other losses that are less important, but without a doubt will cause suffering in society in the following months.

"I hope it will be months not years because it's also an economic issue as well. Lots of people are going to lose their jobs. These are sad moments when you see so many people dying,” Nadal stated.

The Spaniard, 33, further added that even when tennis does resume the players will need to recover their fitness levels.

"It will be a very tough job to regain fitness and you will need lots of discipline and lots of suffering.

“The sooner we can resume activity the better. From the point of view about going back to competitions, I'm pessimistic.

"But there are many other things more important than tennis,” Nadal concluded.

Nadal is due to play in a virtual Madrid Open with 32 of the world's best players swapping rackets for gaming controls in a computerised version of the tournament.

The five-time Madrid champion (Nadal) will be joined by another former World No. 1, Andy Murray, in Group 1.

They will square off in the virtual version of the tournament, with Gael Monfils — who is an avid gamer — and Denis Shapovalov also in the same group.

Nadal recently joked in a recent Instagram live with Andy Murray that “they don’t want me to do well in Madrid this year” and that he only recently played the game for the first time.

When Murray said he selected Nadal as his character to compete on clay against Roger Federer, the Spaniard asked if he “hit against [Roger’s] backhand all the time” for the match.

This tournament will be played from 27-30 April, with the round-robin qualifying groups taking place on 27 and 28 April.

The top two players in each group will advance to a knockout quarter-final draw.

The tournament aims to donate a total of €50,000 (Sh6 million) to the Madrid Food Bank to help reduce the social impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.