By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Thursday April 29, 2021
Roger Federer has been concentrating on his training and achieving his stated goal of peaking on the grass in 2021, ever since he finished up his first appearance in over a year at Doha in March. The Swiss, who defeated Dan Evans, but fell to Nikoloz Basilashvili in the quarterfinals after holding a match point, has been on the training trail ever since.
His coaches believe he is not quite ready for prime time yet, but getting closer, as he prepares for two appearances on the clay—the first at Geneva (May 16-22) and the last at Roland-Garros—before he switches his focus to the grass.
"As far as physical fitness is concerned, Roger is still a little late," said one of his longtime coaches, Severin Lüthi, in an interview with Swiss television, as reported by L'equipe.
Lüthi says that the next step will be for Federer to play more matches.
“He still has some shortcomings and we need to focus on that. The training on the court is quite intense and of good quality, but it still does not happen as often as it should in the intensity of a tournament."
But his other longtime coach, Ivan Ljubicic, still seemed confident as he spoke to La Gazzetta dello Sport. Like Lüthi, he believes Federer needs more matches.
“Roger is doing very well. When he got back to Doha it seems to me that he showed this little something with the racket in hand, he is still able to do it. So there is confidence. Hopefully he plays a number of matches to regain his rhythm. We always want to win big titles. "