Switzerland Would Love To Have Federer On Their Davis Cup Team

Written by: Bob Larson Tennis on 16th September 2013

Switzerland Would Love To Have Federer On Their Davis Cup Team

epa03842501 Roger Federer of Switzerland hits a return to Carlos Berlocq of Argentina during their match on the fourth day of the 2013 US Open Tennis Championship at the USTA National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, New York, USA, 29 August 2013. The US Open runs through Monday 09 September, a 15-day schedule for the first time. EPA/JASON SZENES |

By February, 2014 and the time comes for the Davis Cup’s World Group to swing into action for a new year, the chances are Stanislas Wawrinka will have overtaken Roger Federer as Switzerland’s top ranked player. But Wawrinka, who for so long has stood in the long-time no.1’s shadow, desperately wants his countryman to return to national service.

The Swiss were forced into a last minute reshuffle of their team in last weekend’s World Group play-off against Ecuador when captain Severin Luthi replaced 21 year old Henri Laaksonen with 32 year-old Marco Chiudinelli as he was not happy with the youngster’s commitment during practice in Neuchatel.

Federer’s availability for the Swiss cause has long been a subject of frustration for both Wawrinka and Rene Stammbach, the president of the Swiss Tennis Federation since 2006. The winner of a record 17 Grand Slam event singles titles normally elects to miss the early year Davis Cup matches but plays in the September tie that invariably sees Switzerland fighting for World Group status.

However this year even that was not the case and Wawrinka revealed: “My dream is that Roger would text me and say, ‘Go and win this tie and next year I’ll be a part of the team,’ ”

Although Federer has long maintained one of the few remaining unfulfilled ambitions he has from tennis is to help Switzerland to Davis Cup glory, he apparently remains aloof. As early as May of this year, he announced his unavailability for the September tie.

Several times in the last few years Stammbach has questioned Federer’s commitment to the cause and as long ago as 2010 he said: “At the end of the day it’s always going to be his decision – we don’t have a contract with him. We’re just depending on his good will. If he wants to defend the colors of the country, that’s up to him.

“It’s not that we absolutely want to force him to say ‘yes’. We can’t expect that from him. But we would like to know what the goal is in his head – is it still to reach the semifinals or finals of the World Group or even win it?

“But if the goal has changed – and his actions lead me to believe it has – then I think we also have to readjust the goal. We cannot go on traveling with 17 people to a zonal group match. It’s not in proportion to the goal. That’s what we need to clarify.”

Even Chiudinelli, who would presumably lose his place if Federer did return to the fold, said: “Obviously everyone on the team, including myself, are disappointed that he does not help us more often in these early rounds.

“I always regret that he is not playing more. Everyone on the team regrets it. But there is nothing we can do about it.”

Topics: 10sballs, Davis Cup, Roger Federer, Sports, Stanislas Wawrinka, Tennis