Tennis: Del Potro? Raonic? Who’ll Make Up the Next Big Four?

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at Internationaled.org

Published: January 3, 2013

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Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, Andy Murray and Rafael Nadal have established themselves as the Big Four of men’s tennis. Between them, they carved up the Grand Slam cake last year and took home eight of the nine Masters titles available. (Take a bow, David Ferrer at the Paris Masters.)

But the landscape is changing somewhat. In the last six months, we’ve seen how the tour looks with a Nadal-shaped hole in it and, at 31, Federer’s days as an elite force in the ATP are surely numbered.

That leaves us with just Murray and Djokovic of the current Fab Four. Both aged 25 (and born just a week apart), the two friends will be enjoying final Sundays for some time yet.

So, we’ve had tantalising peeks at how the tour might look without the quartet who’ve taken centre stage on the game’s great arenas in recent years. But who’s waiting in the wings? Who might the next Big Four be?

Next Four

Of the current ‘Next Four’—Ferrer, Tomas Berdych, Juan Martin del Potro and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga – only del Potro is younger than Murray and Djokovic.

Berdych has been knocking on the door for some time, but success in the men’s game these days relies on beating not just one superstar, but two—and that’s something the big man from the Czech Republic has never quite managed.

Ferrer has beavered away in the backcourt his entire career, reliably beating those he should beat, but rarely taking out one of the leading lights. At 30, the little Spaniard isn’t one for the future.



Tsonga will be 28 in April and his only successes in 2012 came at ATP 250 events in Doha and Metz. The genial Frenchman also failed to go beyond the quarterfinals in any of the nine Masters events and couldn’t find a way out of his round-robin group at the World Tour Finals.

Del Potro could be a different matter. Alr...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Tennis

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