By Erik Gudris / Tuesday, October 22, 2013

 

Roger Federer admitted that he should not have played several matches while suffering with a bad back, including his Indian Wells quarterfinal with Rafael Nadal.

Photo Credit: Stephen White/CameraSport
 

As he prepared to compete at this week's Swiss Indoors event in Basel, Roger Federer admitted that he should not have played while injured several times earlier this season.

Federer, who continues to go through one of the most difficult seasons of his career, said that playing with a bad back in several matches this year was a mistake.

"With hindsight, I shouldn't have done that. They were errors," Federer said about those matches while speaking during a pre-tournament press conference in Basel, Switzerland, on Sunday. The current world No. 7, Federer said he was wrong to dismiss, as he put it, "a mild tweak" after he won over Ivan Dodig in an early round match at the BNP Paribas Open earlier this spring.

That tweak soon led to increased back pain as Federer headed into a highly anticipated quarterfinal match against Rafael Nadal, their first meeting against each other in over a year.

Nadal went on to easily win the match 6-4, 6-2.

"I should never have played after Dodig," Federer admitted, while going on to say he lost practice time soon after.

After losing early at this year's Wimbledon to Sergiy Stakhovsky, Federer tried to make up ground by committing to playing clay court events in Hamburg and Gstaad this summer. While he reached the semis of Hamburg, Federer lost his opening round match in Gstaad to Daniel Brands.

Federer said that he should have not played either event.

"I should have abandoned in Hamburg, not played Gstaad. Nevertheless, I played, I tried."

After early round exits both at the US Open and in Shanghai, Federer now finds himself trying to gain points to qualify for the upcoming ATP World Tour Finals in London. Federer currently stands in seventh place in the race just ahead of fellow Davis Cup teammate Stanislas Wawrinka.

Federer realizes the race is close and anything could happen, including not making the eight-man season finale.

"I will be happy if Stan qualifies," Federer said. "If that meant I will miss it, I honestly won't care. That means he was the better player for the year."

Federer won his opening round match in Basel on Monday with a 6-4, 6-2 win over France's Adrian Mannarino.