Roger Federer creates yet another record
Roger Federer has practically achieved almost everything that there is to achieve in tennis. He certainly has nothing to prove to anyone. But what is even more remarkable is Roger continues to break and create new records even during the off-season despite having a not so great finish to the 2018 season.
Roger Federer broke the Top 20 of the ATP charts in the summer of 2001 and he has remained there since then despite missing the second half of the 2016 season due to a knee injury. In 2003, prior to his landmark Wimbledon win, Federer cracked the ATP Top 10 for the first time in his career after winning the now-defunct Hamburg Masters. From October 2002 to November 2016 inclusive, Roger had spent 734 consecutive weeks inside the Top 10, second only in the all-time list to American Jimmy Connors whose number stands at 791.
A brief spell of about 3 months saw Federer slip out of the Top 10 but winning his 18th Major at Australian open in 2017 propelled him back to the top 10 - a position he has continued to hold since then.
Federer despite a few disappointing losses towards the end of the 2018 season considers the 2018 season to be hugely satisfying owing to his win at the Australian Open marking his 20th Grand Slam title.
Federer in 2018 managed to equal Jimmy Connors and Andre Agassi's record of finishing inside the ATP Top-10 for a record 16 years in total. Connors is the only man to achieve the feat on 16 consecutive occasions. If Federer were to finish inside the top-10 next year too, he would be in a league of his own with season closing ranking of top-10 for 17 years. The only man who now can overtake Connors' 16 consecutive top-10 ranking finishes is Rafael Nadal who has been ranked inside the Top-10 unbroken for 14 years since 2005.