Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal will play together in doubles on Friday at the Laver Cup, in the last match of the illustrious Swiss tennis player’s career.
Federer, who is the holder of 20 career Grand Slam titles, and his eternal rival, Nadal, the most successful male player in history with 22 major titles, will play for the European team and face a duo from the team world championship featuring US Open semi-finalist Frances Tiafoe and Jack Sock.
The schedule for the first day of activities of this competition created by Federer’s management company was unveiled on Thursday.
Two-time Grand Slam finalist Casper Ruud will first face Sock in singles, then French Open finalist Stefanos Tsitsipas will take on Argentinian Diego Schwartzman. The holder of three major career titles, Andy Murray, will then rub shoulders with the Australian Alex de Minaur in the early evening, then it will be the turn of the Federer-Nadal duo to tread the ground in doubles.
It should be noted that Quebecer Félix Auger-Aliassime will also participate in this competition, with the world team.
Federer, 41, has announced he will retire after the Laver Cup, following a series of major surgeries on his right knee. He hasn’t played in an official singles or doubles match since his quarter-final loss to Hubert Hurkacz at Wimbledon in July 2021.
In February, when the first rumors evoking the presence of Federer in London this week began to circulate, the main interested party indicated that Nadal had left him a message offering to play doubles with him again. They had joined forces to win their doubles match at the first edition of the Laver Cup in 2017.
“If we’re able to share the court together once again in doubles,” Nadal said in February, “then it would be a very special experience for us at this point in our respective careers. »
Federer and Nadal have delivered some of the greatest tennis matches of the past two decades. They have faced each other 40 times in total (Nadal has won 26 times), and 14 times in Grand Slams (‘Rafa’ has won 10 times). Nadal had overcome his eternal rival in the final at Wimbledon in 2008, in one of the greatest matches in history. Federer, however, won their last duel, in the semi-finals of the tournament presented at the All England Club in 2019.
“It would be, I imagine, a unique situation, if that happened,” the Swiss said Thursday of a possible doubles match with the Spaniard, before we know for sure that he will play doubles with Nadal. For us too, after having known the careers that we have known, to be able to find each other and have a good relationship, it is, I believe, a beautiful message, not only for sport or tennis, but beyond all that. »