One thing is clear: Roger Federer loved tennis, and still does. He loves his wife for letting him play; he loves his friends for playing with him; he loves to hold a racket in his hands. That’s why he cried: because he was leaving tennis behind. It’s what gave his life meaning. Roger is tennis.
Those sorts of tears, by both Federer and Rafa, (sitting next to each other at the end of The Laver Cup), are natural and understandable. What’s still a little confounding is Zverev’s case. Yeah, he rolled his ankle in his last match with Rafa—and doubtless that hurts—but it seems to me that something else was going on there. Still no word spoken on The Tennis Channel about his condition.
I glimpsed him in the audience at the Laver Cup, but his absence from the court remains a mystery. I’m just about to hit against the Biltmore wall, as I do every Sunday afternoon.