{"id":456467,"date":"2026-03-04T04:26:16","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T04:26:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/456467\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T04:26:16","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T04:26:16","slug":"gael-monfils-picks-number-one-between-novak-djokovic-rafael-nadal-roger-federer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/456467\/","title":{"rendered":"Gael Monfils picks ‘number one’ between Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gael Monfils has broken down his experiences of playing Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer and identified a clear \u201cnumber one\u201d between the Big Three.<\/p>\n

Monfils, who will retire from tennis at the end of the 2026 season, has played a combined 50 matches against the legendary trio during a glittering pro career that began in 2004.<\/p>\n

The 39-year-old Frenchman amassed a 4-10 record against Federer and a 2-14 record against Nadal before the two icons retired in 2022 and 2024 respectively.<\/p>\n

The former world No 6 has lost all 20 of his encounters with Djokovic, with the matches spread across a 20-year period between 2005 to 2025.<\/p>\n

In an interview with Sound Off Sports<\/a>, Monfils began with Djokovic when asked to name the hardest players he has faced in his career.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course, for me number one is Novak Djokovic. I never beat him. I never beat him\u2026 so far, maybe this year a last chance if I have to face him,\u201d said Monfils.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor me, Novak has this capability to actually answer all my questions, because tennis is a lot of questions; you ask, you answer, and he was just too good. And of course, he is a legend of our sport, so no shame of that.\u201d<\/p>\n

ATP Tour News<\/p>\n

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The 13-time ATP Tour titlist then spoke about the challenge of playing Nadal.<\/p>\n

\u201cDefinitely Rafa. Same in a way, that I can beat him, but the thing is, he beat me way more than I beat him. I think I only beat him twice,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut he was extremely hard to play against, with his physical, he was imposing you, like a really rough and physical match. His capability of moving the ball is extremely different because he was lefty. He was just different, as well. Another big legend.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Federer, Monfils said: \u201cFederer was just a quicker thinker, quicker player.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything you maybe think that you want to do against him, he knew it, sometimes before you. It was unreal how he could escape awkward situations. His finesse, his flair of tennis was completely different.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Frenchman added:\u00a0\u201cSomehow, those three guys, three of the biggest legends of our sport, were just beautiful to play against, beautiful to learn, and also extremely fun for me to play against.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ NEXT: Federer, Nadal, Djokovic? Former world No 3 names toughest opponent and gives GOAT verdict<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gael Monfils has broken down his experiences of playing Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer and identified…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":456468,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-456467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=456467"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/456467\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/456468"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=456467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=456467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=456467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}