The Retirement of David Ferrer: Symbol of Spanish Tennis

Learn more about David Ferrer, his illustrious career and his retirement.

David Ferrer is truly one of the outstanding tennis players of the last decade. Evidence of this is in his individual titles and winning three consecutive Davis Cups. He’s considered one of the leaders. However, now it’s time for his retirement from professional tennis.

The Masters 100 of Madrid 2019 won’t be remembered as just more tournament. Instead, it’s known as the last game for David Ferrer. This Spanish ex-tennis player has been one of the great elites for many seasons. Now, at 37 years old, he’s left his mark. Read on to find out about his career.

Retirement is complicated for an athlete. David Ferrer, the topic of this article, chose the Madrid tournament for his farewell match. And he was very pleased. There were two presentations at the match, including a celebration for the special occasion.

Throughout the years, this athlete from Alicante, Spain, won the respect of his peers, specialists, and the general public. Continuing, we’re going to look at the career of “Ferru”. 

The beginning of Ferrer’s professional career

David Ferrer began his professional career in 2000. In his first year, his ATP world ranking was 209. His first success was in Bucharest in 2002 when he was just 20 years old. In that year, he went to the ATP finals and won three in the “challenger” competition. This is the second-highest level of competition in tennis.  

From the beginning, Ferrer stood out on the clay court. Others are Rafael Nadal and Carlos Moya. What made him stand out was his combative and feisty style. Even more, he had a way of dragging out arguments about points concerning his rivals.

Later, in 2005, Davi Ferrer got into the first eight of the Roland Garros Tournament (French Open Tournament). This was his introduction to the best tennis players in the world. 

Two years later, in 2007, the predictions of his talent were confirmed.  He participated in the U.S. Open semifinal, the last grand slam of the year.  In addition, he played in the Shangai Masters Tournament, where he was in the finals with Roger Federer.

Then in the season finale of 2009, he was among the 20 best players in the world. And, this was for the fifth time in a row. Besides this, he was a regular winner in the finals. In an era of four fantastic players (Nadal, Federer, Djokovic and Murray), who dazzled everyone, the one from Javea, Alicante, was hard to beat.

David Ferrer and his decisive point

The numbers after Ferrer’s retirement leave little room for discussion. He won 27 ATP titles and was a finalist in the Roland Garros Masters Tournament in 2007. He won three Davis Cups with his country. Even more impressive, he was one of the top three in the world ranking.

It was precisely the culminating point of his career. That was on July 8th, 2013, when Roger Federer lost at Wimbledon and couldn’t defend his title from the year before. In spite of irregularities from the year before, Ferru finished that season in the third level.

Earlier, in the 2011 Seville finals of the Davis Cup, he played the best match of his career. This refers to the marathon match he played against Del Potro. It was in a series in which Spain would win against Argentina.

His last year

The last match of the “gladiator” ended in 0-4 and 6-1. This refers to the match against Alexander Zverev in the second round of the Madrid Masters. Curiously, just a month before, in the Miami Masters, Ferrer experienced his last hurrah. He beat Zverev with an incredible score of 2-6, 7-5, and 6-3.

Not only was this a special night because of the results, but Ferrer hadn’t won a top 5 since 2015 when he beat Nishikori. Besides this, he participated in matches in the United States only by special invitation of the organizers.  His schedule for 2019 only included tournaments in Auckland, Buenos Aires, Acapulco, Barcelona and Madrid.

It’s indisputable that one of the tennis icons of the last decade has now retired. Needless to say, he was one of the court professionals with an enviable historic record of 734 victories and 377 losses.

Beyond his record as an athlete, Ferrer stands out for his kindness and personal qualities. Because of that, the world’s best tennis players attended his farewell ceremony. They included Nadal, Federer, Marin Cilic, Kei Nishikori, Juan Martín del Potro and the historic Manolo Santan.