Original piece from Enrico Serrapede for www.ubitennis.com
In 2001 in Italy, in the city of Milan, a young prodigy of men’s tennis named Roger Federer was winning his first ever ATP title. A decade and a half later, the Swiss has lifted a trophy an impressive total of 87 times, 17 of those being at Grand Slam events. To start a list of all records collected by Roger over the years would not be the point of the piece, but clearly the Swiss doesn’t need further introduction.
What we want to try to find is out is whether the most successful player at Grand Slam events could also end up becoming the biggest loser in the sport at this level. Clearly we first have to redefine the term ”loser” if we want to proceed. Federer has won a total of 11 titles in the past two years (6 Masters 1000, 6 ATP 500 and 2 ATP 250) and can’t therefore be defined a common loser, considering how some players finish a successful career with less titles under their belt than that.
During his 15 years of career, the Swiss has ended a year without lifting a Grand Slam trophy a total of 6 times. Four of these times were in the last four years (2011, 2013, 2014 2015) while two more were in the first years Federer started playing professional tennis. These numbers would clearly show a normal downfall for a tennis star? Some may forget that the Swiss can still be considered one of the very few alternatives to Novak Djokovic’s domination over men’s tennis.
In his career Federer has lifted a trophy a total of 88 times, while the losses in the final have been 48. The second number is clearly quite high. For instance Djokovic has finished runner-up in his career only 26 times, while Nadal has been stopped in the last act 32 times in total.
Percentages are as follows:
Federer 65% finals won, 35% finals lost;
Nadal 68% finals won, 32% finals lost;
Djokovic 70% finals won, 30% finals lost;
Going into detail and analyzing for instance the Masters 1000 events and the finals the Swiss has played since 2012, we can see that Roger has lost in the final a total of 9 times while winning 6 titles. Three titles were won in 2012, the rest over the following years. Of the 9 finals Federer has lost, 5 were matches the Swiss lost to Novak Djokovic (not considering the withdrawal in the finals in London in 2014) and 1 to Nadal, Tsonga and Wawrinka. In the tournaments won, 2 times Roger beat Djokovic in the final, the other opponents beaten being Simon, Ferrer, Berdych and Isner.
Finals lost:
2015
Roma vs 6-4 6-3 Djokovic
Indian Wells 6-3 6-7 6-2 Djokovic
ATP Finals 6-3 6-4 Djokovic
2014
ATP Finals w/o Djokovic
Toronto 7-5 7-6 Tsonga
Montecarlo 4-6 7-6 6-2 Wawrinka
Indian Wells 3-6 6-3 7-6 Djokovic
2013
Roma 6-1 6-3 Nadal
2012
ATP Finals 7-6 7-5 Djokovic
Finals won:
2015
Cincinnati 7-6 6-3 Djokovic
2014
Shanghai 7-6 7-6 Simon
Cincinnati 6-3 1-6 6-2 Ferrer
2012
Cincinnati 6-0 7-6 Djokovic
Madrid 3-6 7-5 7-5 Berdych
Indian Wells 7-6 6-3 Isner
After focusing on Masters 1000, let’s now analyze Grand Slam events, where things didn’t go much better for Federer. Let’s consider the data from 2012, the year Roger won his last major title at Wimbledon. Not considering the stats precedent to that tournament, where Roger clearly was dominating men’s tennis and major events, we can see that from 2012 the Swiss has 1 Grand Slam final won and 3 finals lost. In fact, Federer has lost 75% of the major finals he played in. Roger switched from losing 30% of the finals onto losing 75% of them. 2016 hasn’t started well in that sense, considering the final lost in Brisbane to Raonic and the umpteenth loss to the Serb in Melbourne. Worrying bells have started to ring, and the knee injury didn’t help the Swiss get back to his best in time for the first Masters 1000 of the season in America.
Remember the percentage of finals won vs. lost? Let’s have a look at that percentage yet again, but this time only considering from 2012 on.
Federer 18 titles, 18 finals
50% won, 50% lost;
Nadal 22 titles, 12 finals
65% won, 35% lost;
Djokovic 35 titles, 12 finals
74% won, 26% lost.
The numbers show a decline for Federer, while Djokovic clearly dominates tennis also in numbers and Nadal stays in the average.
Identifying a trend to losing, we can say that Federer has gotten recently quite a habit of losing. The numbers we have reported in the article are clear, even though it would be impossible to consider the Swiss and his results only starting on 2012, because that is not what Roger will be remembered for.
Considering what the Swiss achieved in his career and the heights he has reached with his tennis and results, it would be hard to imagine that Federer is happy with being able to go as far as runner-up appearances in major events. Federer has lost to Djokovic the last three Grand Slam finals he played in, each time losing to the Serb while not playing his best. While Djokovic has been able to bring out his very best for major finals, the Swiss has struggled to keep the level up in the last act as shown before during tournaments.
No, Roger will not be remembered as the biggest loser of all time, but clearly he should be tired by now of seeing trains passing by without stopping.
