French police recover €300,000 watch stolen from Rafael Nadal

PARIS // Police in Paris have recovered a €300,000 (Dh1.3 million) watch stolen from Rafael Nadal at the hotel where he stayed during the French Open and have arrested a hotel employee, according to a police source.

The source said police tracked down the presumed thief, a hotel barman, yesterday after tracing his hotel access badge, which was used to access the room in which Mr Nadal stayed with his parents during the championship.

He confessed to having entered Mr Nadal's room and taken the luxury watch, and brought police to the spot where he had hidden it along a railway track near his home in Essonne, south of Paris, the source said.

French media reported that luxury watchmaker Richard Mille had lent Mr Nadal the watch for the French Open, which the Spanish tennis sensation won for a record seventh time on Monday, beating Serbia's Novak Djokovic.