ATP World Tour Finals: We look back at previous finals played at London's O2 Arena
Wednesday 12 November 2014 13:05, UK
With Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic claiming nine of the past 11 ATP Tour Finals titles all eyes will again be on the world's top two when they head to London's O2 Arena.
Only the best eight singles players in the world qualify for the prestigious season-ending championships, which will move into its 45th year.
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Reigning Wimbledon champion Djokovic will be aiming to nail a hat-trick of titles in the capital whilst a resurgent 17-time grand slam champion Federer will be seeking a record seventh crown overall.
Since 2003 only David Nalbandian (2005) and Nikolay Davydenko (2009) have come prevented the Swiss maestro or the Serb from taking victory at an event which has gone from strength to strength since moving to the O2 six years ago.
More than one million people have attended the World Tour Finals, making it the world's biggest indoor tennis tournament, and the capital will continue its love affair with the event for one more year.
Here, we take a trip down memory lane and look back at the finals which have graced the magnificent 17,800 capacity O2 Arena ...
2009 Final - Nikolay Davydenko beat Juan Martin del Potro 6-3 6-4
Few people backed Nikolay Davydenko to take the title in the very first year the ATP Tour Finals were held at London's O2 Arena. But just 12 months after the Russian suffered defeat to Novak Djokovic in the Masters Cup final in Shanghai, he was back at the main event and playing the best tennis of his life. The 28-year-old from Volgograd had reached four major semi-finals, two on the clay of Roland Garros and two at the US Open.
An injury-plagued first half of the season left Davydenko outside of the top ten but he found his mojo at the Shanghai Rolex Masters, with victory helping him move up to sixth seed for the tournament on the Thames.
He lost a tight group stage match to defending champion Djokovic 3-6 6-4 7-5 but then embarked on a winning streak, achieving his own personal 'grand slam' in beating Australian Open champion Rafael Nadal 6-1 7-6 (7-4) and Robin Soderling 7-6 (7-4) 4-6 6-3 in the group stage, seeing off the winner of that year's French Open and Wimbledon titles Roger Federer 6-2 4-6 7-5 (for the first time in 13 attempts) in the semi-finals and then overcoming the giant 6ft 6in US Open champion Del Potro to win the most lucrative title of his career.
Only Spain's Alex Corretja and Argentina's David Nalbandian had claimed the title without a major to their name, though at least both had reached a grand slam final before. Industry and aggressive baseline play proved too much of a devastating combination for the fatigued Argentine.
It was Davydenko's fifth title of the year and 19th of his career and even drew unique praise from his opponent in the final. "He's very fast," Del Potro said. "He plays like PlayStation. You know, he runs everywhere. It was very difficult to make winners."
2010 Final - Roger Federer beat Rafael Nadal 6-3 3-6 6-1
This match was billed as the Ali versus Frazier of the tennis arena. Federer opened his year by winning his 16th grand slam title at the Australian Open and was ready for a rumble with the world No 1 from Spain, who was the bookies' favourite having collected the his fifth French Open title, his second Wimbledon crown and completed his set of career slams at the US Open.
It was the first time for 24 years that the top two players on the Tour had contested the title match and the excitement in Greenwich was palpable with footballing legend Diego Maradona, Ronnie Wood of the Rolling Stones and American actor Kevin Spacey in attendance.
Federer came into the match having lost six of his past seven matches with the Spaniard but Nadal was plainly fatigued after his three-hour semi-final epic against Andy Murray. Meanwhile, Federer was in imperious form after dominating Novak Djokovic in straight sets to reach the final. It was the duo's first meeting in London since their legendary Wimbledon final in 2008.
After Nadal levelled the match up, Federer stepped up another gear to rip through the deciding set and become only the third man, joining Pete Sampras and Ivan Lendl, to win the event five times. It was also his fifth title of the year and 66th of his career. "Even though I lost the second set, I'm really happy the way I stayed positive throughout the match," said Federer. "I thought it was clearly a very high level. I don't know if I could have played any better, so I'm really pleased."
2011 Final - Roger Federer beat Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 6-3 6-7 (6-8) 6-3
The fourth-seeded Swiss became the most successful player at the season-ending championship, marking the 100th final of his career with his 70th title over the big-hitting Frenchman. At the age of 30 Federer showed that his hunger for success has not diminished as he successfully defended his crown, winning an unprecedented sixth title.
But he didn't quite have things his own way in the final with Tsonga hitting back to save a match point and forcing a deciding set. But the master of court manipulation soon upped his tempo to run away with the match by the banks of the Thames and join Ivan Lendl on an unmatched 39 match wins at this tournament.
"I know it's one of my greatest accomplishments," said Federer who ended the season without a grand slam title for the first time since 2002. "This definitely is an amazing finish again to the season. I've never finished so strong. I couldn't be more happy, I couldn't be more exhausted."
His vast army of fans always believed in the second coming of Federer and the great man delivered when it mattered to climb back up to world No 3.
2012 Final - Novak Djokovic beat Roger Federer 7-6 (6) 7-5
Six-time champion Roger Federer was back in the final and attempting to become the first player since Ivan Lendl to win three season-ending championship titles in a row. On his 11th appearance at the season-ending event Federer suffered a surprise defeat to Juan Martin del Potro in the group stage, but still made it through to another final with victory over Andy Murray.
Top-seeded Djokovic was showing imperious form sailing through to the showpiece without as much as breaking a sweat. The Australian Open champion, who triumphed in Shanghai four years earlier in the event, was down by a service break in both sets but showed great resilience to fight back and capture his sixth title of the season.
"It's very satisfying for my team and myself to conclude this fantastic season with a World Tour Finals win," said Djokovic. "I never got to the finals of this tournament in London. The furthest I got is semi-finals a couple years ago where I lost straight sets to Roger. I wasn't really feeling this surface very well in past couple of years. But this year has been different. I got motivated, got a little bit more physically fresh. I wanted really to fight and I really wanted to get as far as I can in this tournament. Winning all the matches I played makes it even more special."
The Serb completed the season with a personal-best 75-12 match record.
2013 Final - Novak Djokovic beat Rafael Nadal 6-3 6-4
Novak Djokovic completed a successful defence of his title with sweet revenge over his nemesis Rafael Nadal. His most recent defeat came against Nadal in the US Open final but there was little prospect of a repeat during a one-sided contest on the blue hardcourt in the capital.
The Serb was back in truly ominous form as he clinched his third win at the season-ending event to go with his triumph a year earlier and 2008 success in Shanghai. Victory was also his 22nd in a row and gave him a fourth straight tournament success to end the season having also won in Beijing, Shanghai and Paris over a remarkable six-week period.
"I am very proud of the way that I managed to recover and perform better and better as the tournament went on," he said. For Nadal, it was a disappointing performance to finish what had been a scintillating season. After returning from a seven-month injury lay-off in February, the left-hander won 10 of his first 13 tournaments, including the French Open and US Open to take his tally of grand slam crowns to 13, third on the all-time list behind Pete Sampras (14) and Roger Federer (17).
He had already clinched the year-end No 1 ranking for a third time regardless of the result against second-ranked Djokovic, whose win in their Open-era record 39th meeting reduced his deficit to 22-17 in career head-to-head matches.
