Fernando Gonzalez Sets Date for Retirement

Written by: Staff on 10th February 2012

Fernando Gonzalez Sets Date for Retirement

Chilean Fernando González hits the ball against Italian Fabio Fognini during their match of Davis Cup held at the Court Central in Santiago de Chile, Chile on, 16 September 2011. EPA/Felipe Trueba |

Fernando Gonzalez has announced his imminent retirement after enduring a succession of career threatening injuries and only being able to play five main ATP World Tour tournaments in the last 16 months.

Gonzalez, the 31 year-old Chilean who won 11 ATP titles, three Olympic medals (a gold at doubles with Nicolas Massu and a bronze in singles at Athens in 2004 and a silver in Beijing) peaked as the world’s fifth ranked player a little over five years ago and will play his last tournament at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami, starting March 21.

The man with one of the most forceful forehands in the history of the game underwent hip surgery on October, 2010 and his return to action was further hampered by a long standing knee injury that allowed him to play just two ATP events as well as Wimbledon and the US Open last year.

Speaking in his home city of Santiago, Gonzalez said: “I decided to end my career as a professional at the tournament in Miami. I decided to step down and retire from professional tennis out of respect for my career.

“It’s 100% personal. I realized that I no longer have the energy I need to performance how I want. In 2009 I played in pain. I always said I was going to play until the age of 30 and, in recent months, I thought about the actual decision and I made it about three weeks ago.”

Gonzalez contested last week’s Chilean stop on the ATP World Tour, the VTR Open in Vina del Mar, winning against Spain’s Pere Riba before losing out in the second round to Brazilian Joao Souza. He admitted it was a difficult task but said: “If I retired at Vina it would have been too emotional. Miami means a lot for me and there are a lot of Chilean people over there. I also want to say goodbye to my friends on the tour.”

The 2007 Australian Open runner up will also compete at the Brasil Open in Sao Paulo next week and then the Copa Claro in Buenos Aires the following week before heading to Miami next month.

After amassing a career haul in prize money of $8,836,251, Gonzalez can take time to consider what he wants to do with the rest of his life. “I want to have a new start,” he said. “I’ll still be working for tennis, because it’s my passion. I’ll take some time to think what I will do.”

Topics: Fernando Gonzalez