Twelve years ago, tennis entered its golden era. The birth of the Roger Federer/Rafael Nadal rivalry in 2006 heralded the start of a new age in the men’s game. With the arrival of Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray, shortly afterward, this created what many now refer to as ‘the big four.’ Tennis had never had it so good. Each man, in his own right, could have dominated the sport for the next 10 years, except constantly battled against three other players, all of exceptional brilliance. Their dominance superseded anything that had come before them, they had an iron grip over the whole of the ATP Tour.
Many thought it would end in a blaze of glory, one final major title or a five-set thrilling defeat to the next generation of talent (think Federer vs Pete Sampras Wimbledon 2001). Yet we couldn’t have been more wrong. Djokovic and Murray currently occupy the treatment table, playing a single tournament between them over the last eight months. Nadal has now failed to complete three consecutive tournaments, retiring mid-match for only the second time in his career. So how did injuries kill off tennis’ Golden Era?
The Tour
Be under no illusion, to master any sport you have to dedicate your life to it. Tennis is no different. The ATP Tour lasts 47 weeks, with 71 tournaments spanning all six continents. Throw in the daily gruel of training alongside the constant traveling and you have an exhausting 11-month schedule. Then try repeating that over a minimum of 15 years. It becomes quite taxing.
After an early retirement from his quarterfinal showdown with Marin Cilic, Nadal suggested the hard slog of the tour might have become too much for even the game’s most seasoned competitors.
“Too many players (are) getting injured. I don’t know if they have to think a little bit about the health of the players.”
The Spaniard wasn’t mincing his words. He clearly feels the tour has to take responsibility for the rising number of injuries that have slowly crept into the men’s game over the last 12 months, especially at the top end. Since July 2016, all of the big four have taken six months or more off from the court at some point. In addition, 2017 had also seen Kei Nishikori, Stan Wawrinka, and Milos Raonic prematurely shut down their campaigns, all citing injury problems. But if the tour has become so much of a physical burden, could the players simply elect to play in fewer tournaments?
The ATP World Tour has two very juicy carrots tucked up its sleeve to combat just that, all metaphorical of course.
The first of these proverbial vegetables is prize money and financial incentives. Prize pots in almost all ATP tournaments have grown considerably over the last 10 years. Of the nine Masters 1000 events, five have increased their total prize money by more than 50% since 2007. The smallest financial increase was in Monte Carlo, where prize money ‘only’ increased by $2 million. Tennis has become an ever more lucrative sport with the rewards for staying at the top end the game increasingly evident.
If a player felt he wasn’t close to being 100% fit but could make the quarterfinals of a major tournament, there would surely be a handsome reward to go alongside it. That’s not to say players are motivated by greed, far from it, but prize money certainly helps the tour retain its biggest stars on the court for as long as it can. Until now of course.
The second incentive is ranking points. Alongside financial gain, players are constantly jostling to move up the ranking system. A higher rank usually goes hand in hand with a kinder early round draw, certainly in the Grand Slam and Masters events, from which a player can establish a comfortable base for the rest of the season to consolidate and push on. Once again, a scenario can develop where a player may not feel at his physical best but due to the high stakes of the tour, missing out on a tournament is simply not an option.
Murray’s current hip problem stemmed from his grass court season last year, where he was defending a maximum 2500 points from both Queens and Wimbledon. Successfully doing so would also have lengthened his stay as world number one. If he was in pain and needed to rest without the burden of defending such a large point haul, I suspect he probably would have. Ironically, by playing through the pain last summer, he looks set to miss nearly a whole year on tour and lose nearly all his points altogether.
The players
Although perhaps it’s too easy to blame the tour exclusively. After all the players retain free will with regards to when they train, which tournaments they enter, and how, ultimately, they look after their bodies.
The rise of the physicality and athleticism over the past decade has been commented on numerous times by a plethora of critics and commentators. Nadal vs Federer during the 2008 Wimbledon final, Djokovic vs Nadal at the 2012 Australian Open final or Murray vs Djokovic at the US Open final later the same year. Just three examples of matches which were brutal, hard slogs up until the very last ball. These elite players continually push themselves to full capacity in search of glory. Some will rather poetically say its in their DNA. But the fear is that in their search for success they have sustained a level of gruel upon their own bodies for so long that they simply cannot take it any longer.
Perhaps part of being a great champion is knowing when to back down to save yourself for a later date. Federer elected to take the whole clay season off in 2017 and reaped the rewards later on in the year. While Rafa, Novak, and Andy might want to take a leaf out the Swiss maestro’s book, I fear the damage may already have been done.
Looking to the future
Last year’s inaugural Next Gen Finals saw shorter sets -reduced to four- with automatic hawk-eye challenges, giving the crowd a more pacy match experience while shortening the time the young players were out on the court. While it was a radical change that some fans found a step too far, it might be time for such changes to be implemented all season long in an effort to protect the next batch of young stars destined for the top.
Could the ranking system not also be modified to reflect a players performance over two years instead of just one? If we want the biggest and best names in the sport to have the chance to showcase their talent for as long as they wish, then surely the framework to enable them and other professionals to do so has to be put in place.
As the current golden era of tennis comes to a sudden and unimaginative end, there are surely many lessons to be learned. Lessons in the way the tour protects its players but also lessons for the way in which the players look after themselves. If we want to avoid this injury nightmare again, then surely we cannot tempt fate twice, something has to change.
All good things must come to an end but it didn’t have to end like this.
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ATP Writer & Analyst at The Runner Spots
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