Roger Federer’s recent comments on the current state of the ATP Tour have stirred distress among the fans and they are blaming Novak Djokovic for it.
During his recent talk with GQ Sports, the 20-time Grand Slam winner expressed his views about the lack of variety in the current tennis games. He stressed the fact that the one-hand backhand has almost vanished from the courts.
Federer talks about the current state of Tennis and how the Top 10 matches have become pretty straightforward and “side to side”. The Swiss Maestro wants the matches to go “back and forth” with a lot of variety.
“What we get more and more nowadays is that I wish that sometimes we had a little bit more variety, and also back and forth coming to the net a little bit more, not just side to side,” Roger said.
He stretched his point by saying that he implemented the mix-up strategy in his own play and how it affected the opponents.
“And my goal on the tour was always—playing every point in a similar way against my opponent is what he wants. What he doesn’t want is if I mix it up and have variety,” Federer added.
He termed the current trend of the ATP Tour as an “arm wrestling game” and urged other players to play Tennis instead.
“So for me, seeing two guys play against each other and have 20 same points back to back to back, come on. It can be very interesting. It’s like an arm wrestle. But I like to say, “Let’s not enter the arm wrestle. Let’s enter another game,”” Roger concluded.
Fans react to Roger Federer’s comments on lack of variety, blame Novak Djokovic
After fans came across Roger’s recent comments they were fast enough to blame his all-time rival Novak Djokovic for the current state of boring on the Tour. They raised fingers towards the 24-time Grand Slam winner for his defensive playstyle.
One fan was infuriated enough to say that Djokovic has “ruined” the sport.
The fan states: “Djoker ruined beautiful sport because he never had it in him to innovate anything!! His arsenal is literally pushing to the limit and hope!! No wonder he’s been placed as a 3rd option by the tennis fraternity.”
Djoker ruined beautiful sport because he never had it in him to innovate anything!! His arsenal is literally pushing to the limit and hope!! No wonder he's been placed as a 3rd option by the tennis fraternity
— Tony (@Salamanca_00) March 14, 2024
So true. Novak ruined tennis. https://t.co/3n3OVaJKag
— Abdullah Butt (@Geekworld007) March 14, 2024
While some of the fans were busy playing the blame game, there were also few who named players who were playing “variety Tennis”. The name that recurred most was Carlos Alcaraz.
Carlos Alcaraz is the only top player today that provides that variety, the rest of the best are all more or less boring baseliners.
— Patrick Michael (@mpmarky) March 14, 2024