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Amid all the great stories about breakthrough seasons and debut Major wins in 2024, there were of course far less palatable stories, involving controversy, appalling on-court behaviour and inexplicable decisions by players and coaches alike.

Here are ten terrible things in tennis in 2024 – stories from the dark side of the sport.

Ten Terrible Things In Tennis In 2024

1.The Sport’s Drug Problem

To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, to have one world #1 fail a drug test could be considered a misfortune; to have two world #1s fail a drug test begins to look like carelessness. And yet that is precisely the position that tennis finds itself in at the end of 2024, with both Jannik Sinner (the current Men’s world #1) and Iga Swiatek (the women’s world #1 for most of 2024 and the two years before it) having tested positive for banned substances.

The two cases are different, with Sinner’s exoneration by the tennis authorities still being challenged by WADA (the World Anti-Doping Agency). However, their impact has been cumulative. Many people have accused the tennis authorities of applying different processes, protocols and standards in their treatment of Sinner and Swiatek to their treatment of other tennis players who failed drug tests and were banned immediately and for a long time, including Simona Halep, who of course suffered such a long ban herself.

Tennis must be exceedingly careful. It is sometimes thought that illegal drug use is less of a problem in what might be called the more highly skilled or technical sports, such as tennis, basketball or football/soccer, than in sports that require more speed, strength and stamina, such as athletics and weightlifting, on the basis that “there’s no pill for skill”. But to adopt such an approach is naïve at best and dangerous at worst. A “pill”, or injection, might not be able to add skill per se but it can certainly improve other more obvious physical attributes, such as oxygen intake or even just concentration, to enable an athlete to execute their skills for longer. That is why no sport, including tennis, is exempt from the danger to its fundamental integrity that performance-enhancing drugs present.

1. Rafael Nadal’s Farewell To Tennis

Roger Federer’s farewell to tennis was about as good as it gets, notwithstanding the fact that he lost the last match he ever played, which was a doubles match in the 2022 Laver Cup in which Rafael Nadal was his partner.

By contrast, Rafael Nadal’s farewell to tennis was pretty imperfect, if not utterly underwhelming. The irony is that Nadal was saying farewell to tennis not in the glorified exhibition event that is the Laver Cup but in the genuinely competitive environment of the Davis Cup, the original (and still best) team event in tennis, and in his native Spain to boot. In the end, though, nothing really went well for Rafa or his big farewell.

The problem was that if Nadal had been assessed on 2024 form only, he would probably have been nowhere near the Spanish Davis Cup team, such has been his descent down the rankings in the two and a half years since his last Major win at Roland Garros in 2022. Nevertheless, the desire of all Spain to say “gracias” to arguably the country’s greatest ever sportsperson almost necessitated his inclusion.

However, even if sentimental reasons demanded that Nadal be included in the squad, they did not necessitate his selection in singles. He might possibly have merited inclusion in the doubles, perhaps alongside his Olympic doubles partner Carlos Alcaraz, but instead David Ferrer selected him for the first singles rubber of Spain’s quarterfinal against the Netherlands. It was a decision that even Nadal himself seemed to question after he lost limply in straight sets to Botic van de Zandschulp. Thus, the most visibly competitive tennis player ever ended up losing his final match to possibly the least visibly competitive tennis player ever, with even the triumphant van de Zandschulp looking a little sheepish at having won.

1. Andrey Rublev’s Unending and Ultimately Self-Defeating Histrionics

In one sense, it must be hard being Andrey Rublev, Stefanos Tsitsipas, Alexander Zverev, or any other member of the “Nearly Gen” who seemed set to supplant The Big Three of Djokovic, Nadal and Federer at the top of men’s tennis until the arrival of The New Two of Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz. Suddenly, their chances of winning the Major Singles title that they all covet seem greatly diminished, if not extinguished forever, and Andrey Rublev for one seems to be taking it very hard.

That may have been one of the reasons that he so often resorted to shameful and ultimately self-defeating histrionics on court this year, most notably in Dubai in the spring when he was disqualified from the tournament for unsportsmanlike conduct, namely screaming repeatedly in the face of a line judge who had invoked his wrath.

That was the most spectacular example of Rublev’s seemingly unending capacity for self-destruction and even self-abuse on court. In other tournaments, he not only engaged in similarly offensive behaviour but even injured himself when whacking himself with his racket, usually after making an unforced error.

The two most composed male tennis players of the last 50 years, Bjorn Borg and Roger Federer, exhibited similar behaviour in their youth, before finally realising that the person they were doing most damage to was themselves. But Rublev is no callow youth, behaving as the average teenager might behave. He is already 27 and if he cannot find a way of curbing his worst on-court behaviour, he will only diminish further his already slim chances of winning a Major title in the era of Sinner and Alcaraz.

1. Top Players Such As Shelton and Raducanu Opting Out of the Olympics

The presence of tennis in the Olympics remains contentious, given that, unlike most Olympic sports, a Gold Medal is not the greatest achievement in tennis, whatever Novak Djokovic, the newly crowned Men’s Singles Olympic Champion, might say to the contrary. Nevertheless, it is possible to argue that the Olympic tennis competition, which of course only happens once every four years, is a “Fifth Major” of sorts, especially when it is played at a Grand Slam venue, as it was this year at Roland Garros. Consequently, not to appear at all at the Olympics is at least a missed opportunity and perhaps even an act of career self-sabotage.

There were several high-profile absentees from this year’s Olympic tennis in Paris, notably Ben Shelton on the men’s side and Emma Raducanu on the women’s side. Ostensibly, they and the other Olympic absentees were focusing on the North American hardcourt swing in the lead-up to the US Open and felt that playing on European clay would be detrimental to their chances of doing well at the year’s final Major.

In the event, neither Shelton nor Raducanu nor any other high-profile Olympic absentee did particularly well in North America, including in New York. It is true that the two winners of the US Open did not appear at the Olympics, but that was not through choice: Aryna Sabalenka, who would not have been allowed to compete for Belarus because of its support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, was injured; and Jannik Sinner had to withdraw from the Olympics because of tonsilitis.

For other players, such as Shelton and Raducanu, the tennis at the Paris Olympics was not just a unique, indeed once-in-a-career opportunity to compete at an “Olympic Slam” (an Olympic tournament hosted by a Major venue). It might also have acted as a springboard to future success at the Majors and on the regular tour, as proven by Andy Murray in 2012 and Quinwen Zheng this year. It may be that more tennis players are attracted to play at “The Hollywood Olympics” in Los Angeles in 2028, but those who didn’t play in the Paris Olympics undoubtedly missed out on an extraordinary experience.

1. The Scheduling of the Next Gen Tournament

It would be fascinating to know the thoughts of the players who have reached the Next Gen event in Jeddah and even more fascinating to know the thoughts of their coaches. That is because their reward for a year’s progress on tour is to play in a tournament right in the middle of what passes for the tennis off-season, effectively meaning that they will have no proper break at all between the 2024 and 2025 seasons.

The Next Gen event usually takes place before the ATP Tour Finals, acting as the most appetising of appetisers by showcasing the young men who might eventually challenge for the sport’s biggest prizes. This year, however, it will take place just before Christmas (18 to 22 December). Presumably, the reason for this is to give the Next Gen entrants a unique focus outside of the regular tennis season. Whatever the reason, though, it is not a good one. There is enough sports science already to show the detrimental effect that overplay can have on a young athlete’s body. But you don’t need to be a sports scientist to realise that not allowing young players have a proper break, or indeed any real break at all, between one season and the next is a recipe for near-certain disaster.

1. Holger Rune’s Decline in Form

Holger Rune has himself said that he wants to be The Third Man of the new era of men’s tennis, competing alongside Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz at the top of the sport for its biggest prizes. But at the end of 2024, he seems much more likely to remain in the pack of players below the level of The New Two than he is to join them at the elevated level that they play at regularly.

Rune probably has as much natural talent as Sinner or Alcaraz, but he seems to lack their sheer strength, both physical and mental. As long ago as June of 2023, I wrote that he needed to find the stamina to go alongside his obvious talent, but 18 months on there does not seem to have been any real improvement. Rune may have made the odd quarterfinal or even semifinal in 2024, but he achieved nothing like the stellar consistency of Sinner nor the Olympian heights of Alcaraz (even if Alcaraz could not quite make it a summer treble by adding the Olympic title to his French Open and Wimbledon triumphs).

More than two years on from Rune’s truly historic 2022 Paris Masters win, when he became the first man ever to win a tournament by beating five of the world’s top 10, the danger is that that triumph was the exception that proves the rule, the rule being that Rune invariably does not hit such heights. Unless he can find a way to perform consistently on tour, which must include finally settling on a coaching set-up that works for him, he will never match the Major-winning triumphs of his contemporaries Alcaraz and Sinner.

1. Daniil Medvedev’s Decline in Form (Especially on Serve)

Between The Big Three and the New Two, there was a brief period in men’s tennis at the end of 2022 when the best three players in the world came from three different tennis generations. That incredibly short-lived “New Big Three” were Novak Djokovic, a member of the original Big Three who was still contending at the top; Carlos Alcaraz, the Spanish prodigy who had just won his first Major (the 2022 US Open); and Daniil Medvedev, the only player from his tennis generation (which is the same tennis generation as the aforementioned Rublev, Tsitsipas and Zverev) to have won a Major, the 2021 US Open, when he not only defeated Djokovic in the final but denied him the Calendar Slam.

More than three years on, Medvedev’s sole Major triumph is starting to look as much of an outlier or exception to the rule as Holger Rune’s sole Masters victory. Medvedev has certainly failed to build on it. He may have reached four other Major Singles finals since, most recently the 2023 Australian Open final, but he has lost them all.

Arguably, it was on the 2023 Asian swing that things really began to go wrong for Medvedev, because after defeat to Jannik Sinner in the China Open in Beijing (which was the first match that he ever lost to the Italian) he has been supplanted by Sinner at the top of men’s tennis. After losing to Sinner again in the Melbourne final, in which he won the first two sets before collapsing to lose in five sets, Medvedev seemed to lose his way all year, rarely reproducing the magical tennis he had played in 2021 in particular, which was his breakthrough year.

Worst of all was the decline in Medvedev’s serve. His game has always been unorthodox, to say the least, built as it is on the flailing limbs that have given him the nickname of “Octopus”, but it had also always been effective, including his serve. By the end of 2024, however, he seemed to have lost all confidence in it and what had been one of his biggest weapons became probably his biggest liability. If Medvedev is ever to get back to the world’s top three, or higher, he will have to remedy those serving gremlins as soon as possible. Otherwise, he will no longer make Major finals, let alone have any chance of winning them.

1. Naomi Osaka’s Thwarted Comeback

At the start of 2024, it was hoped that Naomi Osaka, the four-time Major winner and former women’s world #1, would be able to get back to her spectacular best after a long time off court, first because of physical and mental health issues, and then because of giving birth to her first child. Ultimately, however, Osaka’s comeback was inconclusive at best and completely thwarted at worst.

There was one match in which Osaka showed that she was capable of returning to the breathtakingly high level that she had operated at consistently at the end of the last decade and the start of this one, during which time she won two US Opens (in 2018 and 2020) and two Australian Opens (in 2019 and 2021), and proved that she was the best hardcourt player in women’s tennis. That match came in the second round at the French Open, when she held matchpoints against the defending champion Iga Swiatek before finally losing 7-6 (7-1) 1-6 7-5.

That one match in the second round of a Major was the only time that Osaka really suggested that she could get back to her best and challenge for Major titles again. She herself has subsequently admitted to feeling frustrated, if not bewildered, by her apparent inability to return to her best. But of course careers (not just in sport but in any walk of life) are not like taps or faucets; they cannot just be turned off and then turned on again easily. Having missed so much tennis in what were perhaps the peak years of her career, Osaka may never be able to get back to her absolute best. Then the question will be not about whether she can return to the top of tennis but whether she will want to continue playing tennis at all.

1. Dreadful Scheduling, Especially during the Asian Swing

Tennis is, of course, the hardest sport to schedule, precisely because it does not have a time-limit; matches can end almost immediately or go on seemingly forever. Nevertheless, even within the particular difficulties of scheduling tennis matches or even entire tennis events, there is one thing that all schedulers should avoid, namely scheduling the final of their tournament at the same time as the final of another one.

The situation is even worse when a WTA final is scheduled at the same time as an ATP final, because many tennis eyeballs will initially be drawn towards the men’s final first, forcing the women’s final to operate in the relative shade. Yet that is precisely what happened on the Asian swing of this year’s tennis season, when the final of the Shanghai Masters was scheduled at exactly the same time as the final of the Wuhan Open.

The men’s final, between Jannik Sinner and Novak Djokovic, was ultimately a far less exciting match than the women’s final, between Aryna Sabalenka and home favourite Quinwen Zheng. Nevertheless, many tennis fans will have missed at least the start of the women’s final as they focused first on the Sinner-Djokovic match-up. For two important tournaments, one on the men’s tour and one on the women’s tour, to take place simultaneously is bad enough when the tournaments are in different countries, but when they are in the same country (as was the case with the Shanghai and Wuhan finals) there is no excuse whatsoever.

1. The Continuing Deficiencies of the USA’s Davis Cup Captaincy

And finally, after all the drug controversies and collapses in form of leading players, a little light relief, at least for non-American tennis fans. That is because the last of the 10 terrible things in tennis in 2024 that I will focus on was not so much terrible as utterly inexplicable.

That was the selection of the USA doubles pairing for the deciding rubber in the USA’s quarterfinal with Australia at this year’s Davis Cup finals by the country’s Davis Cup captain, Bob Bryan. Bryan, of course, is one half of probably the greatest doubles pairing ever, alongside his twin brother Mike. However, for all his consistent brilliance as a doubles player, he has consistently made mistakes with Davis Cup selection, especially in his own specialist field of doubles.

Bryan had already made some questionable decisions in previous years about the make-up of his Davis Cup team, but nothing quite as questionable as his decision in 2024 to drop the established doubles pairing of Rajeev Ram and Austin Krajicek, and replace them with the completely inexperienced and unproven pairing of Tommy Paul and Ben Shelton. Shelton had already lost one of the great Davis Cup Singles matches earlier that day to Australia’s Thanasi Kokkinakis by eventually succumbing 16-14 in the match tiebreaker. Nevertheless, despite Shelton’s obvious disappointment and physical tiredness, Bryan insisted on pairing him alongside Tommy Paul for the deciding doubles match.

The result was almost predictable, as Paul and Shelton lost in straight sets to the far more established and experienced Australian pairing of Matthew Ebden and Jordan Thompson. What remains to be seen is whether Bryan, one of the greatest doubles players ever, will ultimately be drummed out of the doubles club for overlooking a specialist doubles pairing in favour of an utterly untested partnership of two singles players, one of whom was already running on fumes.

In the third part of his regular three-part series, LWOT’s Martin Keady will look at 10 Things To Look Forward To In Tennis in 2025.