Newsdeck

Newsdeck

Anderson ends satisfying 2018 6th on ATP rankings

South Africa's Kevin Anderson in action against Serbia's Novak Djokovic during their semi final match for the ATP World Tour Finals tennis tournament at the O2 Arena in London, Britain, 17 November 2018. EPA-EFE/WILL OLIVER

Cape Town - Despite the disappointment of losing in the last four of the ATP Finals, Kevin Anderson will feel satisfied with his 2018 season.

The South African’s season ended on a low note when he was beaten 6-2, 6-2 by world No 1 Novak Djokovic at London’s O2 Arena on Saturday night.

Anderson started his maiden ATP Finals campaign with straight-set wins over Austria’s Dominic Thiem and Japan’s Kei Nishikori, before a defeat to Swiss great Roger Federer halted his momentum.

Anderson was far from happy with his own serving display and admitted to not finding the same “sense of freedom and relaxation” against Federer and Djokovic that he had in his first two group matches.

“From my side it was pretty disappointing,” he said after losing to Djokovic.

“I didn’t really play a very good match. I felt unsettled right from the beginning. I knew I had to take care of my service games, because he’s serving really well. And he’s returning well, which definitely makes life difficult, but that’s why he’s one of the best players of all time.”

But for Anderson the positives of 2018 far outweigh the negatives.

It was the 6-foot-8-inch beanpole’s best season to date and he ends the year No 6 on the ATP rankings – the highest-ever year-end finish for a South African man since the computer rankings began 45 years ago.

The last time a South African male player finished the year ranked in the top 10 was when Wayne Ferreira finished No 9 in the ATP rankings at the end of 1995.

Anderson won two titles (New York Open and Vienna Open) and reached the final at Wimbledon where he lost to Djokovic.

At Wimbledon, there was also the highlight of beating Federer 13-11 in the final set of an epic quarter-final, as well as the historic semi-final win over America’s John Isner.

Gallery

Please peer review 3 community comments before your comment can be posted

X

This article is free to read.

Sign up for free or sign in to continue reading.

Unlike our competitors, we don’t force you to pay to read the news but we do need your email address to make your experience better.


Nearly there! Create a password to finish signing up with us:

Please enter your password or get a sign in link if you’ve forgotten

Open Sesame! Thanks for signing up.

We would like our readers to start paying for Daily Maverick...

…but we are not going to force you to. Over 10 million users come to us each month for the news. We have not put it behind a paywall because the truth should not be a luxury.

Instead we ask our readers who can afford to contribute, even a small amount each month, to do so.

If you appreciate it and want to see us keep going then please consider contributing whatever you can.

Support Daily Maverick→
Payment options

Become a Maverick Insider

This could have been a paywall

On another site this would have been a paywall. Maverick Insider keeps our content free for all.

Become an Insider

Every seed of hope will one day sprout.

South African citizens throughout the country are standing up for our human rights. Stay informed, connected and inspired by our weekly FREE Maverick Citizen newsletter.