Europe has had 14 No. 1’s in that time period.

Written by: Bob Larson Tennis on 27th November 2012

BNP Paribas 2012 Masters Tennis Tournament

Europe has had 14 No. 1’s in that time period.

epa03453625 John Isner of the USA returns the ball to Michael Llodra of France during their second round match at the BNP Paribas 2012 Masters tennis tournament in Paris, France, 31 October 2012. EPA/IAN LANGSDON |

Currently, the US has three men in the top 30 with No. 14 John Isner, No. 22 Sam Querrey and No. 27 Mardy Fish, but with the retirement of 2003 US Open champion Roddick, the US will enter a season (2013) without a former Grand Slam winner for the first time in the Open Era.

“There are so many sports in the US and tennis is probably ranked sixth or seventh in terms of popularity,” Monaco said. “On the other hand, tennis is the No 2 sport in my country and in general South America is getting a bit better because we are doing some good stuff there. Asian tennis is also growing because guys like [Kei] Nishikori give more confidence and hope to others going into professional tennis and that is very important.”

Argentina’s highest ranked player is No. 7 Juan Martin Del Potro, who won the 2009 US Open. South America has had No. 1s: Chile’s Marcelo Rios and Brazil’s Gustavo Kuerten.

However, Serbian Janko Tipsarevic, who was also in Singapore, said that he could see an American resurgence.

“I don’t think we’ve seen the end of the US dominance in tennis; they are still a big tennis nation with a lot of great players,” he said. “It is just that they put their standards so high up that people think that they’re struggling when their No. 1 player is ranked 10th or 11th in the world. I think they are going to come around – I am not going to say when, but I sure hope it doesn’t happen when I am still playing.”