Last week, Roger Federer announced on his Instagram account that he would be undergoing an operation on his knee that he said was a follow-up to an injury he sustained during Wimbledon earlier this year. It is the same type of injury that he got in last year’s Australian Open that required him to get two knee surgeries that sidelined him for the rest of 2020. So this will be the third knee surgery in the last 18 months.
This news does not come as a complete shock considering Federer opted out of the Tokyo Summer Olympics in July and missed all of the U.S. Open tune-up tournaments, but it is alarming. The surgery means that he will miss the U.S. Open as well as all of the remaining tournaments in 2021. With Federer announcing that he will be out several months, and offering no specific timetable for his return, it’s not much of a stretch to suggest that retirement is on the horizon for the 20-time Grand Slam Champion.
If this is the end for Roger Federer, the 40 year-old tennis player has a lot to be happy about. He has over twelve hundred match wins, a total of 103 career singles titles, and has been the number one tennis player of the world for a total 310 weeks, and has been the year-end number one player five times in his career. He’s also second all-time in career earnings with more than $130 million in prize money. That’s nothing to sneeze at.
Federer’s big claim to fame is his record 20 Grand Slam singles titles, which is the most all-time in a three-way tie. Spaniard Rafael Nadal and Serbian Novak Djokovic each have 20 Grand Slam singles titles. Federer has also won the year-end ATP Tour Finals six times, has a Gold Medal in Mens Doubles at the 2008 Summer Olympics, and is a Silver Medalist in Mens Singles at the 2012 Summer Olympics. That’s quite a resume.
There’s a disparity in Federer’s feelings right now, which is why it’s difficult to predict his future. Mentally, Federer wants to keep going, but his age and the physical wear and tear on his body is taking him in a different direction. Then you have pride and legacy. Federer’s last match was in the quarterfinals of the Wimbledon, which he lost to Hubert Hurkacz in straight sets, that included a 0-6 final set. With all due respect to Hurkacz, this loss is not what Federer, or any of his fans, want to be the end. It just can’t end this way, which is why Federer will be more motivated than ever to get back in the game and end it on his terms.
If there’s any hope at all that a dominating return is on the horizon, Fed fans can turn to the 2017 Australian Open, 2017 Wimbledon, and 2018 Australian Open as inspiration. Those were the last three Grand Slam singles titles for Federer that brought him to 20 and they came after a major knee surgery, but recovering from surgery at 35/36 years-old is a lot less daunting than trying to do it at 40. Whatever Roger Federer decides to do, he will go down as the greatest player of all-time, leaving it all on the court, doing it the right way, and bringing joy to fans all over the world including myself. That’s the Roger way and the reason we call him Maestro.
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