The loss of Swiss tennis player Roger Federer to Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis is undoubtedly the most surprising result of 2018, however the 36-year-old’s defeat by Basel in the second round of the Masters of Miami already changes the hierarchy in the overall classification of world tennis.

The king of this sport grabbed Spaniard Rafael Nadal’s first place with surprise participation in the Rotterdam tournament, ending Rafa’s 26-year reign in the ATP rankings. In the Netherlands the hell was enough to qualify for the semifinals, however Roger triumphed in Rotterdam’s 500-point tournament, defeating Bulgarian finalist Grigor Dimitrov. For the way of calculations made to determine the world classification, it was clear that Roger Federer would have been incredibly difficult to defend the 2,000 points a year ago into “Sunshine Masters”, as two tournaments are held one after the other in Indian Wells and Miami. 12 months ago Federer triumphed both in California and Florida by eliminating the road in both rapha cases, however this season the 31-year-old from Mallorca made an extraordinary Swiss favor, withdrawing from both tournaments due to physical problems.

Practically, Federer would preserve the throne even after the Masters in Miami would have sufficed even if the title at Indian Wells, but Juan Martin Del Potro canceled the hell of a lot of three opportunities for the game to secure the first Masters trophies in the career. The loss to the Californian tournament final defeated Federer by 400 points, so the Swiss needed qualification for the quarterfinals of Masters in Miami to postpone the stint at least until the closing of the Florida tournament, but the surprise elimination from Kokkinakis returns Rafa to the throne, though the Iberian tennis player has not exchanged any ball in the official match since the Australian Open tournament. Rafael Nadal will officially be the number one on the world on April 2, and Federer’s reign will stop for 309 weeks, however, the Swiss veteran tore up all the records of this sport when he returned to the world’s top floor on February 19, staying there for another six weeks. For the sake of the truth, considering the very easy calendar, it was thought that Federer would not have any problems in qualifying for the top eight in the tournament, an achievement that would most likely had extended the reign of 36-year-old until the end of Wimbledon, where Roger actually has 2,000 points to defend, as the champion in power.

Roger Federer wasted much on Del Potro in the May finals, but also made a mistake for the Australian tennis player, even after winning the set, the king’s opener greatly undermined his opponent, who after all said that this was the best match in career. The 21-year-old of Greek origin who came to this stage from qualifying matches held an excellent match, however Thanasi Kokkinakis ranked 175th in the world classification and such a defeat constitutes only the second chance in Roger Federer’s 18 year career since the Swiss tennis player could have an opponent with such poor rankings, moreover the veteran from Basel had since 2014, who did not lose two consecutive games, then were Stan Wawrinka and Jeremy Chardy who beat Federer one after the other, respectively in the final Masters of Montekarlos and the first meeting at the Masters of Rome. For Kokkinakis this is just the fifth tournament in the last seven months where he participated, however no one has ever suspected the Australian tennis player of Hellenic origin. On the other hand after this heavy loss Roger Federer was expected to declare withdrawal from all the tournaments played during this part of the season in the fields with and, more specifically, the Swiss tennis player will miss Montecarlo, Barcelona, ​​Madrid, Rome and Paris where to run as usual the Roland Garros tournament. Despite the painful elimination, Roger Federer is, however, expected to return quickly to the throne as number 1 of the world, as Rafael Nadal will almost be nearly impossible to defend the nearly 4,800 points the Spanish tennis player won last year at the clay court the same period of the year.