{"id":28349,"date":"2025-04-17T19:55:11","date_gmt":"2025-04-17T19:55:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/28349\/"},"modified":"2025-04-17T19:55:11","modified_gmt":"2025-04-17T19:55:11","slug":"bjorn-borg-says-whether-he-now-regrets-retiring-from-tennis-at-the-age-of-just-26","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/28349\/","title":{"rendered":"Bjorn Borg says whether he now regrets retiring from tennis at the age of just 26"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Bjorn Borg is regarded as one of the greatest tennis players of all time.<\/strong><\/p>\n

He garnered millions of fans due to his exciting baseline play, cool and calm persona and stylish outfits as he glided around the court.<\/p>\n

The Swede ended his career with 11 Grand Slam titles, five at Wimbledon<\/a> and six at the French Open<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But opportunities to add to his tally of majors came to an end far earlier than anyone was anticipating, and it is still one of tennis\u2019 most shocking moments.<\/p>\n

\"PhotoPhoto by Focus on Sport\/Getty ImagesDoes Bjorn Borg regret retiring at the age of 26?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Bjorn Borg<\/a> set the tennis world alight in the 1970s into the early 1980s and his rivalry with John McEnroe<\/a> took the sport to new heights.<\/p>\n

Following their final match against one another at the 1981 US Open<\/a> final, which McEnroe won, Borg disappeared from tennis.<\/p>\n

He then played just two tournaments in 1982 before officially retiring from the sport in January 1983, despite the best efforts of McEnroe to persuade him to keep playing.<\/p>\n

During an interview with Spanish outlet RTVE on Tuesday, over 40 years after his retirement, Borg has expressed whether he regrets choosing to walk away from the game at such a young age.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI think with my tennis I did exactly what you were supposed to do. I was perfect doing the things I thought were important for a tennis player for me,\u201d the former World number one said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was motivated at practicing, eating, sleeping and playing. I wanted to be the best player in the world. Motivation? I wasn\u2019t even 26 when I stepped away from tennis.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut would I change anything? I would, a lot! I would change many things but what I did in tennis over those years I was very happy. I was very successful.<\/p>\n

\u201cI achieved my goals in the future and I won a lot of things. That was one part of my life and then came another life after tennis, maybe not that successful, but in tennis life, I was very successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"PhotoPhoto by Shi Tang\/Getty ImagesWho are the oldest players currently on the ATP Tour?<\/strong><\/p>\n

While Borg left tennis in his mid-twenties, there are several players currently on the ATP Tour<\/a> who are playing into their late thirties.<\/p>\n

The likes of Kei Nishikori, 35, and Roberto Bautista Agut, 38, are both still going strong and are comfortably ranked inside the top 70.<\/p>\n

In the case of Stan Wawrinka<\/a>, he is still playing at the age of 40, and the three-time Grand Slam winner won a match as recently as April 1, when he defeated Timofey Skatov at the Bucharest Open.<\/p>\n

Grigor Dimitrov <\/a>is still one of the world\u2019s top players at the age of 33, and he recently reached the Miami Open semi-finals and quarter-finals in Monte Carlo.<\/p>\n

At the age of 38, Gael Monfils<\/a>, who is the oldest player in the ATP\u2019s top 100, won the Auckland Open<\/a> in January and he is still a threat to any player on the tour.<\/p>\n

But arguably the most successful player in his late thirties is Novak Djokovic, who won the Olympic gold medal<\/a> aged 37 at the 2024 Paris Games, and reached last season\u2019s Wimbledon final.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bjorn Borg is regarded as one of the greatest tennis players of all time. He garnered millions of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28350,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4105],"tags":[4294,17062,79,1068,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-28349","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-atp","9":"tag-bjorn-borg","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114355065578841612","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}