Former world No.1 Juan Carlos Ferrero has reignited his conflict with Alexander Zverev after saying players like him need to work harder away from the court if they want to upstage the Big Three of the sport.
Ferrero, who is best known for winning the 2003 French Open, believes there are numerous things that players must do if they want to end the reign of the illustrious trio. Featuring Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer, the Big Three has dominated men’s tennis for the past decade. Between them they have won 52 out of the last 60 grand slam tournaments and currently occupies three out of the top four spots on the ATP rankings.
“In order to overcome Federer, Nadal or Djokovic, Zverev and the rest of the guys who come after them must improve off the court: from food to fitness.” Ferrero told the 3iGuales Podcast.
Elaborating further the Spaniard made a fresh swipe at Zverev. The two worked together for eight months between 2017 and 2018 before their collaboration ended in what was described as a ‘kind of fight.’ Ferrero accused the German tennis star of not being punctual at training sessions and said he ‘no longer respected the guidelines’ that were set out for him. However, Zverev argued that his former mentor was ‘disrespectful’ towards him.
“We had a kind of a fight in Australia after the (2018)Australian Open, which is fine when it involves me and him. I have those kind of arguments [with other team members] and we are still working fine.” Zverev told reporters following their split.
“That argument there involved my whole team and there was a moment where he was very disrespectful towards everybody in my team and that’s why I had to stop the relationship.”
The relations between the two appear to have not improved much since their fallout. Ferrero believes the German tennis star is currently too inconsistent to be able to win a grand slam tournament. Zverev’s best run at a major took place earlier this year at the Australian Open when he reached the semi-finals of the Australian Open before losing to Dominic Thiem. However, since his top 10 debut in May 2017, he has only managed to reach the quarter-finals of better in three out of 12 grand slam tournaments played.
“I trained Zverev for eight months and I noticed that. He used to go back and forth a lot in the same match and that’s why I think he couldn’t win a Grand Slam yet. That irregularity leads him to play the fifth set heads or tails,” Ferrero said.
“Earning a lot of money when you are young can get you dizzy. At that time, the player’s environment and their role are key factors.”
The work ethic of the 22-year-old, as well as his rivals on the Tour, have also been questioned by Ferrero. The Spaniard says many are being distracted by social media and it is having a negative impact on their tennis.
“They have too many distractions off the court. Phone calls, social networks, friends who suddenly appear…” Ferrero claims.
“I watch them fooling around on Instagram and not thinking about tennis as it was in our time.”
“Zverev was, for example, three hours on the court, but he could not perform quality training for an hour and a half. There were protests. Stops. Anger. Distractions’
“At the time, we collided due to his lack of punctuality and lack of respect for the team members, even though his father helped me a lot.”
Zverev is currently ranked seventh in the world rankings. So far in his career he has won 11 ATP titles, but only one of those have occurred within the past year. His biggest title was in 2018 when he won the season-ending ATP Finals.
