Return Winners: The 2003 ATP Finals

Roger Federer and Andre Agassi faced off in the final of the year-end event.

In 2003, the Tennis Masters Cup—the year-end championships for the top eight players in the world—made its return to the US for the first time since 1989, when it was last held in New York.

All four of the year’s Grand Slam winners made the field, with three of them—Andy Roddick, Roger Federer and Andre Agassi—advancing to the semifinals. Federer won all three of his round-robin matches, including an epic against Agassi in which he fought off multiple match points, to earn his spot in the last four. In the semis, the Wimbledon winner beat world No. 1 and US Open champion Andy Roddick, while Agassi defeated Rainer Schuettler in a rematch of the Australian Open final, to reach his fourth career title tilt at the tournament.

Entering the tournament, Agassi had won his first three encounters against the 22-year-old Swiss and was on the verge of making it four straight before their round-robin encounter. Perhaps buoyed by that escape, Federer entered this match focused from the start and comfortably took the first set 6-3.

Federer went up an early break in the second set before rain halted play for more than two hours. When they resumed, Federer continued to pour on the pressure, winning the second 6-0.

The third set was a more closely contested affair, but Agassi—one of the best returners in the history of the men’s game—was unable to make any headway on Federer’s deliveries, failing to gain a break point. Federer broke at 4-4, leaving him to serve for the match, and on championship point, struck his 11th ace to give him his seventh title of the season.

1

This was Federer’s first singles title on US soil, after having lost his only previous final at the 2002 Miami Open to Agassi.

2

In his 85th career singles final, this was only the second time that Agassi lost a set 6-0. In the other match, the 1990 Miami Open final, he lost the third set by that score against Stefan Edberg, but won in four.

8

In his first two years of playing the year-end event, Federer posted an 8-1 record, having reached the semifinals in 2002 without dropping a match in group play.

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