Murray leaving is a Big 4 wake-up call

THE BIG 4 LEGACY 
Murray leaving is a Big 4 wake-up call

Andy Murray’s tears after playing the last match of his career in Paris said so much about the pain he’s been in for too long, the struggles of this Roland-Garros to Wimbledon and back to Roland-Garros stretch, the relief of finally being done with it all and something I didn’t think he was going to feel: joy. “I was emotional because it’s the last time I will play a competitive match, but I am genuinely happy just now,” he said. “I’m happy with how it’s finished. I’m glad that I got to go out here at the Olympics and finish on my terms, because at times in the last few years, that wasn’t a certainty,” he said.

Andy Murray spent the past couple of years explaining how he had zero wish to retire, but that last back injury was the one to get him to see that there was a joy to be had in retiring from tennis, it seems. And, in a twist that is so fitting with Murray’s career, he got his last hurrah on clay at Roland-Garros and not at Wimbledon. Also, obviously, he had the best last word on this curtain falling on his career with an already cult classic line on social media: “Never even liked tennis anyway”. Bless His Soul (who already has a court named after him at the Queen’s) and let him have all the donuts if he wants to, because anyway he can pay for all of them for the whole world.

I had a feeling that seeing Andy Murray going woke people up somehow about the Big 4 Legacy. Roger Federer retiring was the first blow and the first domino to fall, but you still had the other three. Then we understood Rafa wasn’t going well at all and that Murray wasn’t much better. And Then There Were None One. And that One, Novak Djokovic, clinched the elusive gold he’s been chasing since 2008. I feel that Rafa's struggles and Murray's retirement participated in the overall emotional party that was sent for Novak all around. He’s the last one standing in the greatest era of the game (don’t @ me), and it’s history happening before our eyes. Collectively, we understood that what was still at play was the end of the Big 4. Whoever comes next has still not proved they could create the earthquake of tributes and tears that flooded Roland-Garros, the media, and social media after Nadal lost in Paris, Murray lost in Paris, and Djokovic won.

I was quite shocked when reading that quote from Djokovic, who’s to get soon a museum in Serbia, to press after his triumph when asked if this was the missing piece to the puzzle: “Yes, it is. It is. I’m telling myself always that I am enough. Because I can be very self-critical. That’s one of the biggest internal battles I keep on fighting with myself. I feel like I haven’t done enough or been enough in my life on and off the court. So it’s a big lesson for me. I’m super grateful for the blessing to win a historic gold medal for my country. To complete the golden slam. To complete all the records.”

How can he feel he hasn’t done enough on the court? That he’s not enough? It’s eye-opening on his internal struggles but also on why the Big 4 changed the game: because they never thought their achievements couldn’t be improved or that their level of play couldn’t get better. They never thought it was enough. And it will surely be the same post-retirement (Federer’s ON is coming for Nike, hello). I have the feeling that people now understand better what this era of the men’s game meant and how it’s about to end soon. It could help Djokovic to enjoy one hell of a last stretch, covered by the glory of his own achievements but also standing on the shoulders of the other three Avengers’ tennis ghosts. If you’re asking me what will be the next Big 4’s blockbuster and myth builder, it’s easy: Nostalgia. The Big 4 Legacy should be the men’s tennis version of the MCU.

WTA / ATP
Coco Gauff and the quickest of the turnarounds

Sometimes, it’s good not to have time to dwell on missed opportunities. But sometimes, too quick to bounce back remains too quick to bounce back. Coco Gauff, World No.2, is soon going to see how fast she can get back on her hard-court track. It was never going to be easy for the players who decided to play at the Olympics on clay after the grass season, but what happened to those who went to Paris and got their hearts broken there?

Iga Swiatek, who cried for hours after losing in the semi-finals before clinching the bronze, decided to skip the Canadian Masters 1000 and so delayed her come-back enough to get her head and body back to usual. But Gauff said nope, let’s get right back at it. She can get some points here as she lost in the quarter-finals last year before winning the title in Cincinnati and triumphing in New York. And as she couldn’t defend her title in Washington. The last time we saw her, she was in tears on the court through her loss to Donna Vekic in the third round, angry at the umpire and the whole universe.

So you could be a little worried about her hard-court season. But Gauff seemed already in great spirit when she talked to the press in Toronto, deciding to keep the positive from Paris, and that’s it. "I had a great experience. I mean, it was from not being able to go to Tokyo to be able to go here; I just feel like, you know, LA (2028), I'll hopefully be on the podium. I just feel like that's what life consists of like having a disappointing result and then the next time is like the best thing in the world. (…) I never thought in a million years I would have the honor of carrying the American flag for Team USA in the Opening Ceremony."

And in the Gauff’s book of “Great Memories At The Olympics”, she keeps a special place for trading pins with Rafael Nadal and getting that selfie with Andy Murray. “I finally got a picture with Rafa and traded pins with him. Carlos (Alcaraz) didn’t have any pins, so I didn’t let him get in the selfie! I finally got a picture with Andy, which I always wanted to ask. The two goals were to get a picture with those two, and ironically, they were tennis players, so I could have done it at any tournament!” 

Gauff took all her chances to enjoy her time in Paris and meet other sports stars. “The coolest interaction, I met Katie Ledecky in the elevator… I had a talk with (100m gold medallist) Noah Lyles, which was really cool. It was a natural conversation, but he is just the type of person you can learn a lot from about confidence and believing in yourself. I met Sha'Carri (Richardson), Simone Biles, Suni Lee, the list goes on and on…It was very cool. The US men’s basketball team,” she said, as reported by Eurosport. In the end, it’s because she was open to experiencing it all that she might bounce back quicker and better, as the positives are taking over the negatives.

It’s not easy to get back to the Tour after all the emotions of Paris, and Felix Auger-Aliassime was there to prove it in Montréal. The Canadian, who played for the bronze in singles and clinched the bronze in mixed doubles, lost (6-3, 6-2) in his first match at home against Flavio Cobolli. He got a standing ovation at the start of the match, but it was too quick of a turnaround to deny Cobolli, not qualified for the Olympics, who had reached the final in Washington last week. These couple of weeks after the Olympics are the ones that should show how big of a “points and money” sacrifice those who did the grass-clay-hard gamble actually made. Even if skipping the Games was no guarantee for success, as seen with Ons Jabeur, who couldn’t play in Washington due to a shoulder injury and got beaten in the first round in Toronto by Naomi Osaka (6-3, 6-1).

QUESTION OF THE DAY 
Do they need to be on a break?

You were 60% to think that being an Olympic champion wasn’t Novak Djokovic’s greatest achievement.

BUSINESS / MEDIA 
The US Open has secured ALL the bags

The US Open is maintaining the gap ahead of Wimbledon as far as the prize money is concerned. The last Grand Slam of the year announced a record prize money for its 2024 edition to remain the deepest pocket of the Tour.

The US Open is to give overall $10 million more than last year to reach a prize money of $75 million. It will represent a 20% increase for the winners as men’s and women’s singles winners will each receive a $3,6 million check, compared to $3 million last year. The players who will lose in the first round this year will still pocket $100,000 (an increase of 23%). “The USTA says over the last five years, prize money for reaching the first round of Main Draw Singles has increased by 72 percent ($58,000 in 2019) – reaching $100,000 for the first time, and up 23 percent from 2023. Prize money for the final round of Qualifying has also increased by 63 percent ($32,000 in 2019) over that same time period to reach $52,000, up 16 percent from 2023,” reports Tennis Now. The prize money in doubles will also see a significant increase (+9%), as the one for the mixed doubles will too (+18%). To be clear about the state of that US Open bag: it is the “largest purse in tennis history.”

What do they drive there? A Lexus.

Lexus returns as the official car for the Davis Cup. The ITF and the brand have renewed their partnership, so Lexus becomes a “Principal Partner” for the remainder of the 2024 season, and will provide “official transportation services for players, teams and staff at the Davis Cup Finals Group Stage events in September, as well as the Davis Cup Final 8 Knockout Stage in November,” says a statement. Lexus has been a partner of the Davis Cup Finals since 2019. It’s another deal made by the ITF for the Davis Cup recently after the ones signed with Dunlop, Joma, Quironsalud, Socios, Stake, and UniCredit, all of whom continue to support the world’s premier men’s team tennis competition.

Parting (business) thought: If your business had a bad week - sorry for that!- ask yourself if it had it worse than Warner Bros. Discovery. After already losing the NBA rights, the company was down 10% over the last five days as of Wednesday’s market close and went down for another 9% in the hour following the market close after announcing a quarterly operating loss of more than $10 billion. Not a great tennis news, by the way, as WBD recently bought the broadcasting rights for Roland-Garros.

MENS SANA IN CORPORE SANO 
Playing tennis should be doctor’s orders, says Science

“Playing tennis can lead to healthier bones, greater range of motion, increased cognitive function, and greater longevity than with any other sport.” Says who? The National Geographic. Based on what? Science. “Tennis has endured for so long because it can be played at multiple levels—from social doubles to highly competitive singles—and challenges the whole body in many ways including speed, endurance, strength, technical skills, and strategic planning," says Benjamin Levine, director of the Institute for Exercise and Environmental Medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.

And so, “tennis lowers blood pressure, improves one's resting heart rate, and increases healthy lipid profiles to improve cholesterol levels. These are among the reasons "playing tennis on a regular basis has been shown to lower overall risk of heart disease by up to 56 percent," says Jessica Schwartz, a physical therapist and spokesperson of the American Physical Therapy Association. If you need a reason to start playing tennis or to get back into playing tennis, just give a read to that National Geographic feature, really.

• Pablo Carreno Busta made a winning return for his first Masters 1000 tournament since Paris 2022, and at some point, the Spaniard didn’t even think it’d be possible. He has suffered from elbow tendonitis for years and is still not playing pain-free, as he explained. It's an interesting blink from fate as Carreno-Busta makes this winning return in Montréal, where he won his first Masters 1000 title two years ago.
  

• Montréal wasn’t this lucky for Milos Raonic, who wasn’t even able to take the court due to a right shoulder injury. The Canadian was left heartbroken by this sew setback. “I can manage a lot of things, but without serving, that would be a tough day for me. (…) It came up initially right when I came here on hard courts after the clay,” said Raonic, who still tried to warm up but had to admit he wasn’t going to be able to defend his chances. “It’s a tough decision but the right decision. It was a pretty shitty feeling,” he told the press.

SOME BREAK POINTS… 
One Out, One In, One Back In

• OUT: It’s not a surprise, just a confirmation but it still hurts. Rafael Nadal won’t be seen again competing this summer as the Spaniard announced on Thursday what he had already hinted at through the Olympics: he will not play the US Open this year. “I will miss those electric and special night sessions in NYC at Ashe, but I don’t think I would be able to give my 100% this time,” Nadal said on social media. When is the next chance to spot him? The Laver Cup in Berlin in September is officially his next step. Obviously, Nadal missing the US Open is making everybody wonder if he has now decided to retire. But Rafa might still be making up his mind as he repeatedly said in Paris that he would take time after the Games to decide. One can hope, okay.
  

• IN: Iga Swiatek is the first player to have already qualified for the WTA Finals, which will be held in Riyadh in November. She was champion at the Finals last year and will be able to defend her title. “It's a great feeling to qualify for the WTA Finals for the fourth year in a row,” Swiatek said. "I hope that the performances of the eight best players of the season will give a lot of joy to the fans all over the world,” said the World No.1 in a statement. How did she qualify? The WTA shows you how here. Tickets to the Finals are already available to purchase.
  

• BACK IN: The points are back in. Which points? The ones that were taken away from Denis Shapovalov when he was disqualified in Washington last week. The Canadian player won his appeal: He got his points and prize money back, but he still has to pay that $36,400 fine. Shapovalov took to social media to thank people for their support and say he will still contest the fine. “I also hope the ATP can put better rules in place for protecting players from abusive fans,” he said.

The ATP answered that the officials did the right thing in defaulting Shapovalov as they followed the procedure. Yet… “However, the committee has concluded that loss of rankings points and prize money, which is automatically applied in the case of a default, would be a disproportionate penalty in this case. Shapovalov, therefore, retains quarter-final points and prize money, with a fine of $36,400 applied for the code violation,” they said in a statement to The Athletic. Shapovalov climbs 33 spots to now land on the 106 ranking line and so gets closer to a direct entry to the US Open main draw. He had skipped the Olympics and built his entire summer to build his ranking back. In Montréal for the Masters 1000, Shapovalov said he was so down about all of it that he nearly decided not to play. He lost in the first round, making it even more important to get those Washington points back.

PLAY HARD, TRAIN HARD, DRESS THE PART 
Diamonds Crystals are a girl’s best friend

Sneakers and crystal? Hi. WTA players with a Nike deal, this is your shot at playing tennis with crystal on your feet. The rumor mill says that in May 2025, the Jordan brand will release “a crystal-covered Air Jordan 1 in collaboration with Swarovski.” The price? $1,000. Bonus? “It’ll also apparently be accompanied by a full co-branded apparel collection.” No official picture has been released yet, but mock-ups have already been circulating.

EDITOR’S PICKS 

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