How Roger Federer helped slaughter the Davis Cup

The grand statesman of tennis devalued the Davis Cup by rarely playing in it. Then he damned it with his deafening silence.

Roger Federer saw the Davis Cup as dispensable to his career. Now The ITF has made its 118 years of tradition equally dispensable. picture: Oli Scarff/AFP

The Davis Cup has been murdered. Roger Federer has blood on his hands.

He hasn’t inserted the knife but he’s been an accessory to the fact.

He’s known about the dastardly deed to come and yet offered no objection.

The sport’s greatest statesman may have swayed the debate and yet he’s turned his back and gone strangely quiet while the International Tennis Federation has gone ahead and slaughtered 118 years of tradition.

His silence has been deafening; any silence is a killer.

Federer has devalued the tournament by rarely playing in it, treating the event as dispensable to his career.

If he cannot be bothered with it, either physically or verbally, why should the rest of us care? He’s been unwilling to join the fight for its survival.

His old sparring partner Lleyton Hewitt has begged for the two staples of the Cup’s integrity to be maintained. The best-of-five set matches, and the home-and-away ties and final.

In remaining mute, either Federer does not care or he agrees with the ITF’s demolition job. He’s playing at the Cincinnati Masters later today.

A penny for his thoughts about the Cup going belly-up because until now, he’s steered clear. Too late now. The Cup is a corpse.

Check out the social media photographs from the Kosmos company, owned by Spanish footballer Gerard Pique, which is behind the selling of part of the sport’s soul.

Leaping in the air, punching their fists, rubbing traditionalists’ faces in it … they are dancing on the grave.

Ivan Modia, Tennis Director of the Kosmos sports group celebrates with a team member after the Davis Cup vote at the ITF annual general meeting ended 118 years of Davis Cup as we know it. Picture: Gregg Newton/AFP

A shortened format of an age-old sport — we’ve been down this road in cricket.

The introductions of abbreviated, television-friendly, cash-making events that bear no resemblance to the traditional game have found their place in cricket.

Below them. alongside them. Not in place of them.

For the ITF to create an entirely new tournament, but to still call it the Davis Cup, is like inventing Twenty20 cricket but saying ‘you know what? We’re just going to call it Test cricket anyway. Better yet, we’re not going to play Test cricket at all’.

As Hewitt says: “The competition is not the Davis Cup. You can’t call this the Davis Cup.”

What next in tennis? The abolition of best-of-five set matches for the men at majors, that’s what.

That’s what the ITF wants. You’d expect players to be howling it down, but Wimbledon champion Novak Djokovic has supported the idea.

Even former World No. 1 Andy Murray is partial to it.

The revamp of the Davis Cup will see condense the annual worldwide showpiece into an 18-team, week-long event. Picture: AFP

It seems an unfathomable proposition, but then Djokovic says at the Cincinnati Masters: “I would have even Grand Slams best of three. This new generation of tennis fans and Millennials, they don’t have the great attention span. They want things to happen very quickly. So for the players as well and to attract more people, more viewers of a younger audience, I think we have to keep tennis matches dynamic, shorter and no shot clock.”

Murray has been a five-set warrior but he’s seen the majors from a fan’s point of view while being sidelined by injuries.

“As a player, I really like best-of-five,” Murray has told the New York Times.

“I feel like it rewards the training and everything you put into that. But then, when I sat and watched that Nadal-del Potro Wimbledon quarter-final from the commentary booth — it was an amazing match, it was a brilliant match, but it was really, really long to sit there as a spectator for the first time.”

Federer wants more best-of-five on the regular ATP World Tour.

“We actually don’t have any best-of-five set matches,” he tells the Tennis Channel.

“They’re all at the slams, Davis Cup and at the Olympic finals. I feel like that’s a bit of an opportunity wasted. I know it’s also for player protection, for injuries … I think that’s a bit of a pity, but I understand the reasons.”

If Federer has wanted more best-of-five set matches, he could have played more Davis Cup.

He’s been surprisingly content to watch it all unfold while fence-sitting at best.

Frenchman Nicolas Mahut has been more forthcoming. “They have just killed the Davis Cup,” he said.

Djokovic seems in favour of destroying every traditional fabric in the sport. “It is fantastic news,” he says of the day a century-old institution has died.

He may as well have inserted the dagger himself.

Novak Djokovic would like to see even Grand Slams be played as a best-of-three. Picture: Matthew Stockman/Getty