Feliciano Lopez criticizes Federer for clay court break

Roger Federer has decided for the second consecutive year not to compete during the clay court season in order to preserve his body and focus on the competitions on faster surfaces.

Why Federer is legit not to play

In theory, all ATP1000s, except for Monte Carlo, are compulsory for the top30 players. However, Roger is entirely entitled not to play as per the ATP rules that state as follows

“A player’s number of ATP World Tour Masters 1000 commitment tournaments shall be reduced by one (1) tournament for reaching each of the following milestones:

1) 600 matches (as of 1 January of the commitment year);

2) 12 years of service;

3) 31 years of age (as of 1 January of the commitment year).

If all three (3) conditions are met, then the player has a complete exemption from the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 player commitment.”

Why Feliciano Lopez is not happy with Roger

Feliciano will play the ATP000 in Madrid for the last time in his career as he will be the tournament director starting from 2019 and the director of a tournament is not entitled to play in the same event.

Therefore starting from next year, the Spaniard will have to report to Ion Tiriac (the owner of the ATP1000 in Madrid), and the Romanian wasn’t happy with Roger’s decision not to compete in Madrid

Therefore, Feliciano had to follow the line of Tiriac to comment as follows

“I want Federer to play in Madrid again before he retires. Federer has the same obligation as the other players to play the Masters 1000.

But he again decided not to play at this time of the season, as it will be on clay. It is a pity. It is as important as the grass or hard-court seasons.

I was training with him in Rotterdam, and I was lucky to speak to him. He told me that he admires Santana a lot and that if he were to have played Roland Garros, he could have come to Madrid.

Al of us want to play on the best court, at the best hour, in the best condition, and you can’t please everyone. It’s not easy with tennis players.”


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