Rafael Nadal on Naomi Osaka incident: Players must be ready to deal with hostile fans

Rafael Nadal. Pic/AFP

Rafael Nadal on Monday expressed sympathy for Naomi Osaka following her tearful exit at Indian Wells, but believes players should learn to deal with hostile fans.

Four-time Grand Slam champion Osaka was reduced to tears by a heckler on Saturday as she crashed out of the tournament in a straight sets defeat to Veronika Kudermetova.

Speaking after his 7-5, 6-3 third round win over England's Dan Evans on Monday, Nadal said he felt sorry for Osaka, who was subjected to a taunt of "Naomi, you suck" during her loss on Saturday.

"The easy answer for me is ‘I feel terrible about what happened, that never should happen.'" However, Nadal added, "in the real world", abuse from spectators happens. "Even if is terrible to hear from that, we need to be prepared for that, no?" he said.

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