TENNIS:As eight of the best players in the world gather in London, KEVIN MITCHELLlooks at the issue of burn-out
WHEN THE eight best tennis players in the world gather in London from tomorrow for their final week’s work of the year at least two of them, Novak Djokovic and Mardy Fish, will be operating well below maximum efficiency because of recent or chronic injury.
Fish, who has broken down twice in the past few weeks, may not even make it to work.
The entire field in the ATP World Tour Finals at the O2 Arena will be carrying some twinge, minor or major, real or imagined. Pain is the price modern professional athletes pay for their lucrative lifestyles, and they do well to resist the temptation to complain about it more often than they do.
What they will say, when pushed, is they are asked to play too often. Given their demanding international circus, they utter their mantra: burnout. Recently they have grumbled to the point of considering strike action, an unlikely scenario – although the last time they stood up for themselves, in the Wimbledon boycott of 1973, the game underwent profound change.
On two fronts, however, elite players are on a hiding to nothing when they complain about the gilded existence that is part of the legacy of that rare outbreak of hippy-era militancy.
They know or suspect there will be little sympathy from fans who never see them strapped to the physio table with aching limbs and shredded tendons, nor appreciate the significant physical stresses of their hi-tech calling, not to mention the strain of travel, the suitcase life, the loneliness and the boredom. Tough, is the universal response from lives more ordinary.
And players far removed from the demands of playing nearly every match of every tournament, who leave after a round or two most weeks, will not be on the picket line with their richer comrades. Many would happily play every day. Some just about do, from Chennai to Kitzbühel.
For Djokovic the stumble towards his personal wall did not begin in Paris last week, where he withdrew from the Paris Masters after two matches with what he dismissed as “inflammation” in his right shoulder. Nor did it start in Basel the week before, when he was bageled in the final set of a dispiriting defeat. Djokovic’s shoulder started to give up on him at least three months ago.
When the world number one quit at the start of the second set in the final of the Cincinnati Masters against Andy Murray, he knew the injury was serious enough to jeopardise his chances in the US Open a fortnight later. He received treatment to his shoulder throughout the New York tournament and ignored the inconvenience long enough to win a quite extraordinary semi-final against Roger Federer before reaching a peak of excellence in the final against Rafael Nadal.
While he denied a widely circulated report that he had been to see a friend in New Jersey for radical therapy inside a giant egg-shaped chamber, he was nonetheless fighting his body.
He rested, came back for the Davis Cup and had to retire again, when a set and 0-3 down to Juan Martín del Potro, himself a young veteran of the treatment room.
In Paris, Djokovic struggled on as far as he could, hurt by the accusation that he had only started the tournament to collect €1.2 million as part of the loyalty bonus afforded senior players on the Masters tour. It did not look good, either way.
And that is part of the problem. Sponsors would be apoplectic if players declared beforehand that they might not fulfil their commitment to a tournament. And to be so candid would break the compact of sport, a world where matches are so often won in the mind. Later, they are more comfortable unburdening themselves.
In New York, however, the uprising took place before the end. When Murray, Nadal and Andy Roddick complained that the rain-wrecked schedule in the second week was not giving them the best chance to perform well, they were concerned enough to raise the possibility of taking industrial action. Tennis took a deep breath.
The last major of the quartet, “the Slam from hell”, as Sports Illustrated calls the noisy two-week bash at Flushing Meadows, puts absurd demands on any player who gets past the quarter-finals because US television insists on having both semi-finals on the second Saturday, 24 hours before the final.
In a calendar where events already bump against each other, this is unreasonable. The ATP tour starts on the second day of the year, visits 61 cities (exclusive of grand slam events and the Davis Cup), and leaves room for a six-week break before they do it all over again.
At the start of this 2011 journey, in the emotional moments after losing to a then-fit Djokovic in the final of the Australian Open, Murray said: “I will need to take a little break from training so that mentally I can just get away from tennis because it is such a long season. You don’t want to get burnt out after a couple of months.”
Two weeks ago in Basel, Murray’s right buttock gave up on him. In tennis, you never know where your next pain in the butt is going to come from.
Compare and contrast: 20 years ago
1991
Number of matches played: The world number one 20 years ago was Stefan Edberg and the Swede played in 94 matches that year, contesting a total of 2,089 games in 20 events all over the world
Players' physique: There were only six players in the top 50 of the world rankings who were 1.90m (6ft 3in) or taller, with David Wheaton and Goran Ivanisevic the tallest in the top 20 at 1.93m. In 1991 there were 1,897 aces at Wimbledon.
The ATP tour:78 tournaments (excluding the four grand slams)
2011
Number of matches played: None of the top four this year has played more than 80 matches this season (with the ATP Tour finals to come).
Players' physique:This year there are 17 players who are 1.90m or more with John Isner the tallest at 2.06m (6ft 9in). The players are better trained these days but also exert more energy with their shots as the speed and intensity of the sport has increased so much. The number of aces at Wimbledon has almost doubled in the past 20 years.
The ATP tour: 62 tournaments (excluding the slams)
