'Roger Federer has not been able to give...', says former ATP ace

Advertisemen

Twenty-time Major champion Roger Federer has arrived in London ahead of next week's Laver Cup. Roger will compete for the last time in his career at London's O2 Arena, leading Team Europe alongside Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray. Federer has been dealing with a knee injury for nearly three years, playing just six tournaments since the start of 2020 and never fully recovered. The Swiss underwent three surgeries to take away the pain and lengthen his career, but he decided to end his tennis career after not being able to train without injury. Roger's participation in the Laver Cup remains in doubt after the latest knee setback, but the great champion will give his best to step on the track at least once. Federer is one of the founders of the Laver Cup, having led Team Europe in three of the four editions. Roger played his first Laver Cup match against Sam Querrey in Prague 2017. He only lost six games against the American and shared the court with his great rival Rafael Nadal for the first time that same day. The best players in the world scored a 6-4, 1-6, 10-5 victory over Jack Sock and Sam Querrey to give Team Europe a 9-3 lead heading into the four remaining matches of the competition. The fabulous duo lost momentum in the second set and only claimed one game. Still, they were highly motivated to win this historic match, going ahead in the match tie-break to take home the win.

Roger Federer will try to play in London

While Ivan Ljubicic recently acknowledged that Roger Federer's loss to Novak Djokovic in the 2019 Wimbledon final was very difficult to digest, the Croatian coach this time made some curious revelations in an interview with a Croatian newspaper about of his player's future retirement. According to him, the Swiss was not at 100% of his abilities during this edition of the London Grand Slam… “I tried to help him to win another Grand Slam title, and he won three, so I'm happy with that part of my coaching career. Too bad that due to health problems he has not been able to give his best in recent years. He was also out of form in 2019 at Wimbledon when he missed two match points in the final against Novak. He trained with restraint, between 60 and 70% of his capacity. His body has come a long way and it's understandable that he needs a rest. There are no problems between us and there never will be. We were friends and we remain friends. And we will probably continue to collaborate on certain things. He will surely play other exhibition matches because he loves tennis so much that he cannot live without it."

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/bzrFHTd

Advertisemen

 Tennis