Coach Ljubicic discusses Federer's plans for 2020 and his continued motivation to play on

What's the story?

In a recent interview, Roger Federer's tennis coach, Ivan Ljubicic, spoke about the Swiss Maestro's plans for the next year and pondered on whether he is as motivated and passionate about tennis as he was in his younger days.

In case you didn't know

Ljubicic is credited with helping Federer improve his backhand immensely, turning it from the 'weaker' aspect of his game into one of his strongest shots. He is said to have encouraged the Swiss legend to hit the ball early and on the rise, which he hadn't done so much in the past.

The heart of the matter

Ljubicic began, “Why does Roger continue to compete on the Tour? This is a question you must ask him.” He added, “I only try to make it work as hard as I can and I’m happy to have it so motivated."

Federer's coach continued, “He loves sports, even when he is not in the field: we watch it together, we play with the boys: I have two, a son and a daughter, he has four, in short, we don’t get bored. I hope it will go on for a long time yet.”

Ljubicic then discussed their preparation for the upcoming season, “There is a lot of tennis and a lot of physical work, every day is a little different. Now we are building the base, it is not as easy as when he had only one real ‘off-season’ and in the rest of the season he was sent, now he has to take many small little breaks."

The former pro then stated, “This part of the season, for Roger, is therefore no different from April or summer, when it comes off for two or three weeks."

“Work, work, work: I know that sometimes it seems that everything is easy, but without hard work, there is no success,” he concluded.