Must say I quite like Coric too and he's really improved and I hope he continues to climb and makes it into the top 10. Would much rather see him there than Zverev who I find completely overrated tbh and he's been pure dung at the slams despite his ranking. Haven't been able to watch any of this tournament and tbh was fully expecting Coric to win given how much Roger has declined this year. Watching the highlights was saddening. Everything was just like a different player. His movement which he's renowned for looked absolutely awful. Return was awful, serve was so so, could have been worse. Tons of errors and any rally that wasn't over soon you just knew Roger was gonna net an easy ball or blast it miles wide or long. I know he played 6 hours in 3 matches with little rest, but still. That was really sad to see. He just looks like sad out there himself, just as much as his fans are watching that pale imitation of his former self, wanting hard to play like he used to even at the start of this year but his body and mind just won't let him.
Despite the haters hoping he'll retire, he's gone on record to state he'd like to play at the next Olympics and I've always thought he'd play till 2020 with it being the last Olympics he's likely to participate in, so don't expect him to disappear next year. Yes, that performance today was woeful and looked a lot worse than just 6-4 6-4, which on paper, isn't so bad, but for all the "he should retire nonsense", he still made the semis of a Masters 1000 in his sleep at 37 and playing like complete dog shit, so contemplate that before suggesting he retires. It's not like he lost in the first round. That said, slam winning days and, for that matter, most tournament winning days are over. Many people say write off Roger Federer at your peril, but I have. It's a sad day and if he wins something big again I'll be delighted, but just can't see it at all right now. Can see him even losing to Zverev at the WTF and Zverev shouldn't really be beating him there at all, but the way Roger's playing, I'd expect it. Probably disappoint his home fans at Basel again too. A sad, sad time to be a Federer time and a great day for all the haters. If your favourites are still playing at this age (yes you Nadal and Djokovic fans), I'd expect even worse than this as their games depend way more on movement than Roger's so, be cocky now 'cos we'll remember it when they're like this too. It happens to everyone, especially if they're still playing at 37, which most obviously aren't. At least old Roger Rogered your favourites quite a few times last few years as a geriatric.
:cuckoo:
