JOIN USMissing mighty modern marvels
The last time Roger Federer did not appear in the ATP World Tour Finals, the season-ending tournament was not even called the ATP World Tour Finals.
The year was 2001. The site was the Sydney Super Dome in Australia, and the name of the tour championships featuring the top eight men’s players was the Tennis Masters Cup.
Gustavo Kuerten, the Brazilian baseliner with the musical nickname (Guga), arrived as the No 1 player but failed to win even a round-robin match. Australia’s Lleyton Hewitt, then 20, took the trophy and the top ranking into the offseason after beating Sébastien Grosjean of France in the final.
Federer made his debut in 2002 as the year-end championships moved to Shanghai, where he lost to Hewitt in a tough three-set semifinal. Hewitt retained the No 1 ranking, but that was the end of his dominance.
Federer won the Masters Cup in Houston in 2003, dismantling 33-year-old Andre Agassi, 6-3, 6-0, 6-4, in the final. “He plays the game very gracefully,” Agassi said after the rout. “He could bring a style that would capture people’s imagination, no question.”
So it has played out, with Federer capturing imaginations and titles until this year, an injury-disrupted season in which he had knee surgery, the first operation of his career, in February.
Federer ended his campaign early — playing just seven tournaments before stopping after Wimbledon — and he is now ranked 16th, his lowest ranking since 2001.
Contributing to the watershed moment, Rafael Nadal did not play in the World Tour Finals, either.
“Strange indeed,” said Paul Annacone, Federer’s former coach. “For a long time, we’ve wondered when this era will end. Maybe this is the start of it. I hope not. Roger and Rafa have been the cornerstones of greatness for so long, it’s shocking to the system when they are not there.”
Unlike Federer, Nadal had enough points to qualify for the World Tour Finals, which ends Sunday in London. He would have secured the eighth and final automatic slot, but he ended his season in October because of concerns about his injured left wrist.
Nadal and Federer were together last month for the opening of Nadal’s academy in Majorca, Spain, and both are preparing to return in 2017. Federer will be 35 years old. Nadal will be 30, which might seem promising in an age when so many veteran players have thrived, if it were not for all the miles on Nadal’s fragile knees.
Comebacks from injury are all too familiar to Nadal, but this will be new territory for Federer, who has experienced plenty of back pain but has never been out for such a long time.
Nadal plans to return to the tour at the Brisbane International in Australia in January after playing in an exhibition in Abu Dhabi. Federer plans to return at the Hopman Cup, a mixed-team event in Perth, Australia, after playing in the International Premier Tennis League in Asia in December.
More greatness is far from certain.“Federer and Nadal have become global sports icons rather than just tennis stars,” Chris Kermode, executive chairman and president of the ATP, said in a telephone interview. “And of course there will be a time when their careers will come to an end, and they will be missed. But having said that, no player is bigger than the sport itself, and men’s tennis has had an almost uncanny ability to consistently produce global stars that do transcend the sport. And Roger and Rafa aren’t done yet.”
Without them, the World Tour Finals that Kermode, as tournament director, helped build into a commercial and popular success, still had a drawing card in Andy Murray, the British star and newly crowned No 1 player and Novak Djokovic, the man Murray replaced from the top.
The tournament also had a cluch of 30-and-older stars, including Stan Wawrinka, 31, and Gael Monfils, the acrobatic and erratic Frenchman, 30, the oldest first-time qualifier since 1972, when Andrés Gimeno played at 35. Monfils had to pull out without completing his league engagements while Murray, Djokovic, Kei Nishikori and Milos Raonic moved into the semifinals. The presence of Federer and Nadal would have added colour and excitement but the fans can only hope and pray for their return next year.
“It’s a different year for the fans,” said Marin Cilic, the Croatian who first qualified for the event in 2014, when Federer and Nadal also played. “A different year for the players, too.”