Tennis is often a sport that rewards consistent players for hard work over the course of a season. Consistently going deep into tournaments is often what it is all about. But there will also be those that argue it is not about remaining consistent all the time, but more about hitting form at the right events.
It is perhaps ironic then that veteran Spaniard Feliciano Lopez, a consistent member of the top 100 for so many years, has maintained his best rankings in a period of stop-and-start displays.
Lopez has spent much of his career as an anomaly, one of the few Spaniards who openly embraces the old-school serve and volley displays at every opportunity. He has managed three quarter-finals at Wimbledon, runs that have seen him defeat Andy Roddick, and Mario Ancic in the past. Yet the wily old Spaniard has shown himself to be adept at all surfaces. His two finals this year have come on clay and hard, not his supposed favourite of grass.
Lopez this year has embodied a character that has turned up when it has proved most important (most of the time) to ensure that his run in the top 20 continues strongly at thirty-four years. He enjoyed an uncharacteristically strong start to the year with a Round of 16 showing at the Australian Open. A run that could have been abruptly ended when he faced match points in the first round against young American Denis Kudla. Yet Lopez emerged, and then severely tested eighth seed Milos Raonic in the Round of 16 losing in five. A runner-up showing in his next tournament in Ecuador had whispers of the top 10 being mentioned, and he reached his to date career high ranking of 12 after his quarter-final in Indian Wells, where he defeated Kei Nishikori in straight sets.
Lopez scarcely goes through a season without a blip and this has been no different, even if the environment from whence it came was surprising. It was his beloved grass, with Lopez suffering one of his worst seasons, failing to win consecutive matches on the surface even during its newly extended season. He lost to Sam Groth, John Isner, Yen-Hsun Lu, and most shockingly, Nikoloz Basilasvhili at Wimbledon. At fast as praise for a good season can come, criticism can also, and Lopez was playing well beneath his rank of 16 (at that point) and his hard-earned reputation on grass.
Gstaad represented brief relief from a poor spell, winning back-to-back matches for the first time in a stretch dating almost four months. Still he was now on few horizons with the author of this article expecting him to quickly follow Ernests Gulbis in collapsing down the rankings. Yet he picked up his season again in Cincinnati by shocking Raonic and Nadal before falling to Federer. Picking his time yet again, he took down Raonic for a second time this season at the US Open, before giving eventual champion Djokovic a battle, going down in a fourth set tie-break.
He has again risen to form, and his excellent runner-up showing in Kuala Lumpur shows he is not yet finished this year. It has been a odd year for Lopez, performing well in two Slams, poorly in the others, with similarly up-and-down results in the Masters. His ranking is though, testament to the rewards that going deep at the right tournaments can bring. They can provide your rock when you are down, and be the source of you confidence when things are going well. Things are most definitely now going well again for Lopez, and with his form a top 10 finish looks unlikely, but not entirely out of the question.
