Roger Federer says goodbye to a dream

The first participation of Swiss Roger Federer in the Olympics took place at the Sydney 2000 Games, when he overtook David Prinosil, Karol Kucera, Mikael Tillstrom and Karim Alami before losing in the semifinals to Tommy Haas with a score of 6-3 6-2.

The last edition of the Olympics that saw Roger present was therefore that of London 2012, in which Federer got rid of Alejandro Falla, Julien Bennetau, Denis Istomin, John Isner and Juan Martin del Potro, booking the final challenge with Andy Murray.

Roger Federer says goodbye to a dream
The Scotsman, defeated a few days earlier in the last Wimbledon match by Federer, deserved a rematch with a score of 6-2 6-1 6-4. Absent from the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games, Roger has always promised to return in 2021 to be able to return to play Wimbledon (canceled last year) and the Olympics, postponed for twelve months due to the global Coronavirus pandemic.

However, the Basel champion has played much less than expected this season and, it seems, his knee problems still do not seem completely resolved. Having taken the court in Doha and Geneva without excellent results, Federer managed to reach the round of 16 at Roland Garros, where he preferred to forfeit during the match with Matteo Berrettini.

Arriving in London (after a bitter disappointment in Halle), Roger’s run broke in the quarterfinals against Hubert Hurkacz, who won with a clear 6-3 7-6 6-0. Following his departure from London, as we know, Federer regretfully announced that he will not take part in the Tokyo Olympics so as not to further compromise his right knee.

Forty years to go next August and with the awareness that he will no longer be present at the Games, Roger also had to say goodbye to his Olympic dream.