‘Roger Federer was the first to exercise…’, says former ATP ace
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Despite a few setbacks, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic have won three of the four Grand Slams staged in 2022. The Spaniard has conquered the Australian Open and Roland Garros, proving once again to be a living legend. Having played just seven official tournaments last year, the Majorcan managed to keep the pain in his foot at bay and hoist himself to 22 Majors.
The Serbian, for his part, paid a very high price for his choice not to get vaccinated against Coronavirus. The 35-year-old from Belgrade had to miss the Australian Open and the US Open, but redeemed himself by triumphing at Wimbledon for the fourth time in a row (seventh ever).
2022 will also be remembered as the year of Roger Federer’s retirement. The Swiss said goodbye to tennis played at the Laver Cup, which took place at the O2 Arena in London from 23 to 25 September. The 41-year-old from Basel played his last match alongside Nadal, only to receive a splendid tribute.
During a recent interview with Sportskeeda, Dimitri Tursunov addressed the issue of the GOAT.
Tursunov on the GOAT debate
In an exclusive interview with Sportskeeda, Dimitri Tursunov talks about his experience as a coach but also about his life as a player.
When asked about the GOAT debate, he comes up with a somewhat daring idea. “Honestly, I see these debates and read what people are saying. Everyone comes up with their own argument. I’ve never had this huge desire to try to figure out who’s the greatest of all time and I don’t really pay attention to it.
Afterwards, obviously, Roger Federer was the first to exercise such dominance. Pete Sampras was a huge dominance in tennis as well, but I think Roger took him to another level, then Rafa caught him, followed and passed him, and finally Novak, who passed Roger and is a bit more far than Rafa.
Who knows, maybe someone else will become even bigger than all these players.” Former World No. 3 Ivan Ljubicic, who coached Roger Federer from 2016-2022, has revealed that the 20-time Grand Slam champion is an avid chess player.
“He likes to play kind of bullets to kill time and distract himself. I know more (than Roger) or less but I prefer not to talk about it. He would not enjoy me talking about it,” said Ljubicic. “He got hooked by seeing how fanatic I was about it.
He had the basics and I honestly don’t know if he still does it because we haven’t spent a lot of time together in 14 months since he had surgery but yeah he also knows the general ideas of what’s happening in the chess world,” he added.
Read More: ‘Roger Federer was the first to exercise…’, says former ATP ace 2022-11-20 02:10:00