That Novak Djokovic was the last player standing at the ATP World Tour Finals 2014 was not a surprise, but that he was the only player standing on the final day of the ATP’s 2014 season finale was.
Roger Federer’s withdrawal from the 2014 ATP World Tour Finals pretty much summed up the whole tournament. In a week which did not see a three set match until day five and provided only one classic enocunter between the game’s elite, the no-show that was the final was in many ways the final the event deserved.
Take a look at these scores- 6-1, 7-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-1, 6-1, 6-1, 6-1, 6-3, 6-1, 6-0, 6-3, 6-3, 7-5, 6-3, 6-2. These are the first four days scores at an event contested between the world’s top 8 tennis players.
It was not until Day five when Kei Nishikori and alternate David Ferrer went three sets that anything ressembling a contest played out in the O2 arena, an event that had a 6-1 final set. That match failed to inspire the others either. That same evening Federer came out and thrashed Murray 6-0. 6-1.
Tired players, a slow surface, injuries- it was the stuff of nightmares. The semi-finals did produce two three setters. In the first one, though, between Djokovic and Nishikori, the final set was 6-0. And the second one, the one and only thriller of the week, decided on a final set tiebreaker, was more remarkable for the spectacle of how the two countrymen handled their nerves than it was for its high quality attacking tennis from two of the game’s most aggressive players.
That match may have been satisfying in the short term but was damaging in the long term. It left Federer with a bad back and the event without a final, but in many ways the final it deserved. Not the one the fans deserved, though. The sight of a subdued Djokovic holding the trophy on a day he deserved to celebrate will linger in the mind as the off season whizzes by and the tour restarts in the New Year where hopefully things do not leave from where they left off.
Commentary by Christian Deverille
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