Tags
australian open, bogomolov jr, cilic, clijsters, djokovic, federer, haas, lisicki, malisse, schiavone, serena, sharapova
This year is already off to an incredibly rough start. The first tournaments of the season have barely been completed and already players are practically falling like dominoes. What does this mean for the rest of the year?
Not anything good.
The year’s first three tournaments have been marred with withdrawals and retirements. Serena rolled her ankle during her match with Bojana Jovanovski. She won the match but withdrew the next day. Kim Clijsters won the first set in her semifinal and then proceeded to retire, citing a hip injury. Roger Federer ended up going 3 sets in his quarter with Andreas Seppi (the top 4′s constant punching bag). He withdrew citing a bad back. These are just the more high-profile retirements/withdrawals.
I’m sure most of these are probably more preventative measures rather than serious. Why make a niggling injury worse before the big picture: the Australian Open. The first major of the year is barely 10 days away. Veterans like Serena, Kim, and Fed are preparing more for that than anything else. Still, the injuries so soon in the season is rather disconcerting.
Marin Cilic will not be partaking in the festivities in Australia due to a lingering knee injury, as was announced recently. Going into the New Year, Maria Sharapova was already sidelined with an ankle injury. Who knows how fit and ready she’ll be when the major starts. If anyone can fight through rustiness, it’s Masha. Novak Djokovic is also going in without having played a tournament. Could be a wise move, considering the amount of tennis he played last year.
Sabine Lisicki suffered an abdominal injury during her match with Angelique Kerber in Auckland. Francesca Schiavone, though she played on, she was not well. Tommy Haas suffered a calf injury and withdrew before his second round match. Florian Mayer retired with a groin injury. Xavier Malisse fell ill. Alex Bogomolov, Jr. also had trouble with his ankle. The list goes on…
Put bluntly, the players are dropping like flies and it isn’t even the second week of the year yet. New Year’s Day was just six days ago! If this week is anything to go by, then next week in Sydney will probably be the apocalypse. All jokes aside, hopefully no one else will be bitten by this injury bug. Speculation on so many injuries is coming from the obvious lack of a true off-season. Players barely have any real down time before they’re back up and training again.
Tennis really is a year-round sport; a brutal, grueling, torture chamber of racquets and sneakers with the grunts and shrieks to match.
Brad Gilbert says that this issue needs to be addressed; changes need to be made and unions need to be formed. It is skated around almost every year, but still nothing is done about the lack of off-season that players have. We’re seeing now just how grueling this is becoming with players popping up in the first week of play and immediately injuring themselves.
Hopefully, the players in Sydney will fare better than the ones this week. Should be interesting to see how many survive without a hitch.
