Leading men, shut out of the Slams, retiring
In 2001, Mikhail Youzhny walked forward onto the Australian Open court for his first Grand Slam match, just as he would for the next 17 years at the top tennis tournaments around the world. But in his final Grand Slam match last week, Youzhny walked backward off Court 6 at the U.S. Open.
It was not performance art or an intentional act of symbolism. Youzhny, cramping terribly, was forced to withdraw from his firstround match against Marcos Baghdatis. An athletic trainer asked Youzhny to walk backward to avoid more strain on his quadriceps.
By exiting that way, Youzhny, a 36-year-old Russian, had a chance to look up and wave at his supporters, who stood and applauded a player whose distinguished career was coming to a close.
“It was a very strange way to go off the court,” he said. “I have never seen this before. But it felt much better. I wish I had known about it many years ago.”
Youzhny is one of a handful of male players in their mid-30s who, after long and impressive stints on tour, have announced that they will retire from tennis this year or early next season. They include Julien Benneteau, David Ferrer and Gilles Müller, as well as the 45-year-old doubles specialist Daniel Nestor.
They will walk away having won many tournaments and medals, and plenty of fans. But none ever won a Grand Slam singles title, in part because of the era in which they played. They are the victims, many times over, of a historic trio of contemporaries.
Roger Federer, 37, Rafael Nadal, 32, and Novak Djokovic, 31, have combined to win 50 major titles since Federer’s first one in 2003 at Wimbledon, slamming the door over and over on so many other hopefuls in the past 15 years.
“Sometimes,” Youzhny said, “these guys didn’t give anyone else chances to win. I can’t say I would have won more, but this is a great era for tennis.”
Ferrer came closest to breaking through when he reached the 2013 French Open final, but Nadal beat him in straight sets for his fourth straight title. Ferrer also fell to Nadal in the first round of the U.S. Open, retiring and limping off court (facing forward, unlike Youzhny) with a strained calf muscle before the end of the second set. A former No. 3-ranked player, Ferrer plans to play at a tour-level event in Spain in the spring before stopping for good. But this, he said, was his last Grand Slam appearance.
“I am 36 years old,” Ferrer said. “It’s time to be home.”
Ferrer went 0-17 against Federer in his career and 6-24 against Nadal. He was ousted by Nadal, his fellow Spaniard, in two major tournaments and by Djokovic in three, but he refused to say that he would have won a Grand Slam without the big three in his way.
“Maybe because I have the chance to play with them, I improved my game,” he said. “I improve every year. I had a mission to be a better player. For me, it was a pleasure to play with them, with maybe the best generation, best two or three tennis players of the world.”
Müller, a 35-year-old from Luxembourg, went 2-14 against the big three, scoring one epic victory over Nadal at Wimbledon last year by winning, 15-13, in the fifth set. But Müller lost in the first round of the U.S. Open, leaving Benneteau, who will be 37 in December, as the last of the group with a chance at a Grand Slam title. But Benneteau, of France, lost to Jan-Lennard Struff, 28, of Germany in the second round.
Benneteau, too, doubted that he could have won any Grand Slams in the absence of the troika. After all, his best performance at a major tournament was a quarterfinal appearance at the 2006 French Open. But years from now, he said, he will enjoying telling people that he got to play against the best.
“At times it was very difficult when you had to face them,” he said. “But it was something special and incredible to play at the same time as these three. I think at the end of their career it will be the three greatest players of all time.”
Ferrer has earned over $31 million in prize money, has taken home 27 tour-level titles and has won the respect of his rivals as a unrelenting competitor who maximized every bit of his talent.
Youzhny, the father of two children, aged 9 and 6, is an admired and respected player, too. He won 10 tourlevel titles and reached a career-high ranking of No. 8 in 2013. He reached two Grand Slam semifinals, at the U.S. Open in 2006 and 2010.
He went 0-17 in his career against Federer, 4-13 against Nadal and 3-7 vs. Djokovic. In the end, though, it was the 33-year-old Baghdatis on the other side of the court for Youzhny’s final major match.
Youzhny went down in a heap, and Baghdatis, who also may very well retire without a major title, ran over to comfort him. Youzhny, who plans to play in one more tournament — in St. Petersburg, Russia, in September — received medical treatment for several minutes and then backed off the court and into his retirement from Grand Slam tennis.
“It is the right time,” he said. “For years, my family has been living my life. Now it is time for me to live theirs.”