Roger Federer has praised the next generation of players after all four Shanghai semi-finalists are under the age of 24.
A breakthrough tournament in Shanghai has seen none of the big three left in the last four in Shanghai with all four semi-finalists being under the age of 24.
It is the youngest Masters 1000 semi-final line-up since 2007 in Indian Wells, as Stefanos Tsitsipas will take on Daniil Medvedev. This will be followed by Matteo Berrettini taking on Alexander Zverev.
Speaking of Zverev, he was the one who knocked out Roger Federer yesterday in a dramatic quarter-final 6-3 6-7(7) 6-3.
After his defeat Federer praised the next generation after the major breakthrough this week, “They’re knocking on the door big time the young guys,” Federer said in the press conference.
https://twitter.com/rogerfederer/status/1182683183088881664
“It’s exciting, they’re great. It’s really open now for the finish of this tournament. It was surprising to see Novak lose too even though Tsitsipas has been playing great so far.
“Maybe I was favourite also going into this match, but Sascha came out and had no serving issues today. He was able to produce a great game like he did against me in London. It’s an exciting time in tennis but nothing new there.”
Despite the great week for the younger guys though, they still have a lot of work to do to convince many people that they can oust the big three in the short term.
Although there have been different winners at Masters 1000 events, Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal have all dominated at grand slams.
The last player to win a grand slam outside of the three greatest players of all time was Stan Wawrinka at the US Open in 2016.
So there is a lot of expectation for one of these younger players to break the conventions and provide fans with a different winner to a grand slam trophy.
As for Federer, his next tournament will be the ATP 500 event in Basel where he will look to capture his 10th Swiss Indoors title.
