Davis Cup: Severin Lüthi: “Swiss tennis better than a few years ago”

No Swiss player in the second round of the US Open, no woman or man currently in the top 100 of the annual rankings. Nevertheless, Swiss tennis is not doing as badly as one might think.

The year 2024 will not go down as a good one in Swiss tennis history, no matter what the Swiss Davis Cup team conjures up on the court against Peru on Friday and Saturday. The US Open that has just ended was a low point; for only the second time in the last 30 years, no Swiss, man or woman, made it to the second round of a Grand Slam tournament. And for the first time since 1986, no Swiss reached the second week of any of the four major events in a year.

However, Davis Cup captain Severin Lüthi, who has been critical in the past, does not see this as too dramatic. Somewhat surprisingly, Roger Federer’s long-time coach says: “Even if it sounds a bit stupid right now, I think the situation in Swiss tennis is probably better today than it was a few years ago.”

Eleven Swiss men in the top 450

The numbers support Lüthi’s thesis. In 2017, Roger Federer and Stan Wawrinka in the top ten covered up the lack of a competitive base. In the autumn, after Marco Chiudinelli retired, no other Swiss players were in the top 450 of the world rankings. Lüthi warned of this malaise even then. Although the top is currently missing, there are no fewer than eleven Swiss men between position 124 (Alexander Ritschard) and 420 (Jakub Paul). Four of them are 22 years old or younger. Nine women are also in these world ranking positions.

For Lüthi, the current situation is a snapshot that could look much better in just one year. He points out that in 2023, thanks to successful qualifiers, seven Swiss men and women were in the main draw of the French Open and even eight at Wimbledon. This year, Leandro Riedi also failed in the last qualifying round after his own match point, while Jérôme Kym served for the match at the US Open.

The absence of Bencic

There are good explanations – no excuses, as Lüthi stresses – for the current downturn. Olympic champion and former world number 4 Belinda Bencic is out because of her maternity leave, but will return next year at the latest. Céline Naef, who made her Grand Slam debut at Wimbledon fourteen months ago, has stagnated recently, but is still only 19 years old. “I see it from the outside, but you couldn’t expect her to march straight into the top 20 and reach the Grand Slam semifinals,” says Lüthi. “Only absolute exceptions like Coco Gauff can do that.”

The number of injuries is noticeable among the men. After his breakthrough with the round of 16 at the US Open this year, Dominic Stricker missed the entire first half of the season with persistent back problems. “Otherwise he would definitely be in the top 100.” Leandro Riedi won two tournaments at the Challenger level up to June, reached three more finals and was on a direct path to the top 100, but had to end his season last week due to chronic knee pain.

Jérôme Kym is currently showing how quickly things can go in the other direction. The Aargau native made his Davis Cup debut in 2019, shortly before his 16th birthday, as the youngest Swiss player, but has been repeatedly set back by injuries since then. He missed the second half of last year due to knee surgery. But now he has moved up more than 350 places within five months and is ranked number 151 in the ATP rankings, better than ever before.

Promising juniors

In addition, at least in the men’s team, promising young talents are coming up in the form of Henry Bernet from Basel and Flynn Thomas from Zurich. “You should always look at what you can improve,” emphasises Severin Lüthi. “But you also have to think long-term and not throw everything out the window too quickly.” It is usually only after five or ten years that you can see whether what you are doing with the young talent is the right thing.

The potential is also there, the chances are intact that 2024 will be an outlier in Swiss tennis annals, not the beginning of the end.

ck, sda