{"id":35403,"date":"2025-07-03T13:34:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-03T13:34:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/35403\/"},"modified":"2025-07-03T13:34:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-03T13:34:11","slug":"dan-evans-returns-to-wimbledons-centre-court-a-year-on-from-sacrificing-his-career","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/35403\/","title":{"rendered":"Dan Evans returns to Wimbledon\u2019s Centre Court, a year on from sacrificing his career"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Athletic has live coverage from Day 4 at Wimbledon 2025<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

THE ALL ENGLAND CLUB, LONDON \u2014 This time a year ago, British tennis player Dan Evans<\/a> had a decision to make. He could play the 2024 Paris Olympic Games and partner two-time Wimbledon champion Andy Murray<\/a> in his final event, or he could defend his Citi Open title in Washington D.C.. The former was the romantic option, but missing the latter would mean 500 points coming off his ranking.<\/p>\n

That would send Evans tumbling more than 100 spots toward the bottom end of the world\u2019s top 200, taking away his automatic entry to top-tier tennis events. He would have to drop down to the second-tier ATP Challenger Tour, which is not where any former world No. 21 wants to be, especially in their mid-30s.<\/p>\n

This was no quandary for Evans. He chose the Olympics without hesitation and in so doing helped \u2014 and at times carried \u2014 Murray to two valedictory victories, both from multiple match points down. They didn\u2019t win a medal, but the matches were unforgettable<\/a>. It\u2019s impossible to quantify a sporting experience like that.<\/p>\n

It is much easier to quantify what they meant for Evans\u2019 career \u2014 and it wasn\u2019t pretty. After winning the longest match in U.S. Open history<\/a> by defeating Karen Khachanov in the first round, he settled into his new reality. His first event after New York was the Nonthaburi Challenger in Thailand. In February, he bounced from Bahrain one week to Glasgow, Scotland the next. By the end of March, he was ranked outside the world\u2019s top 200.<\/p>\n

Evans knew what he was sacrificing to play with Murray, but the resultant destruction of his late career still hurt. At Wimbledon 12 months ago, he said that he\u2019d consider retirement if he needed a wild card to enter.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Murray and Evans formed an entertaining double act at the Paris Olympics. (Clive Brunskill \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

After a year of struggle \u2014 and taking the wild card that he never wanted to need \u2014 Evans will face the 24-time Grand Slam champion Novak Djokovic<\/a> on Centre Court at Wimbledon, in a moment that feels as close to tennis karma as can exist. Not that Evans sees it that way. \u201cI think if I believed in karma, I\u2019d be in a bit of trouble,\u201d he said in a news conference Tuesday, after beating Jay Clarke to set up the opportunity to face Djokovic.<\/p>\n

It was a throwaway line, but one that is in keeping with Evans\u2019 character through every stage of his career.<\/p>\n

In his early days, Evans, who stands at 5 feet 9 inches (175cm) but is blessed with excellent hands and a devastating slice, looked as though he wasn\u2019t going to make the most of his talent. The Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) took away his funding for four months in 2008, when he was in a nightclub until 3 a.m. with his doubles partner before a junior match at Wimbledon. It cut his funding again in 2010 and 2012, because of question marks over his attitude and commitment. Evans then failed to turn up for a third-tier ITF event in 2015, and was fined \u00a3350.<\/p>\n

When he finally started to put it together, reaching the Wimbledon and U.S. Open third rounds in 2016 and then the last 16 at the following year\u2019s Australian Open, Evans imploded. He tested positive for cocaine in April 2017, a month after reaching a career-high ranking of No. 41, and was banned for a year. It could have been a precipice for his career, but Evans instead returned with a renewed focus.<\/p>\n

After beating Denis Istomin from two sets down in a thrilling Davis Cup tie that September, Evans fought back tears and later said that he had feared he would never play again. The following April, Roger Federer invited \u201cDanny\u201d \u2014 as he called the Brit \u2014 to Switzerland to train with him. After beating Evans in four sets at the Australian Open a few months earlier, Federer had been so impressed with his opponent\u2019s game, full of slice and forays to the net, that he described him as a \u2018mirror\u2019 of himself.<\/p>\n

Evans climbed to that career-high rank of No. 21 in 2023, and even beat Thursday\u2019s opponent Djokovic at the Monte Carlo Masters in 2021 in their only meeting to date. \u201cI think when they do the stats, it has to be over, like, three matches to have a 100 percent record, so we\u2019ll say I have a decent record,\u201d Evans joked ahead of their meeting.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Evans celebrates after beating Novak Djokovic at the 2021 Monte Carlo Masters. (Valery Hache \/ AFP via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Born and raised in Birmingham, the son of a nurse and an electrician, Evans did not come from the British tennis heartlands of south-west London and Surrey.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019d be cool to see a guy coming up and his parents are painters and decorators,\u201d he told the Daily Mail in 2023. \u201cThat would interest me where his career went. It doesn\u2019t interest me seeing how a career goes of a guy with wealthy parents.\u201d<\/p>\n

Evans\u2019 directness appears to come from wanting to raise standards \u2014 his own and those of his compatriots. Whenever he\u2019s asked whether some good results for British players at Wimbledon signal a meaningful change, his answer is always the same. It\u2019s not about doing it at Wimbledon for a match or two; it\u2019s the other 50 weeks of the year that define a tennis player.<\/p>\n

Those 50 weeks in the past year have been some of the roughest of Evans\u2019 career, and he has been emotional during his recent grass-court matches. He cried during his quarterfinal run in Eastbourne, off the back of beating Frances Tiafoe at the HSBC Championships a week earlier, and did so again during his pre-Wimbledon press conference.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been awful basically,\u201d Evans said Saturday of his year in the tennis wilderness.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not \u2026 It\u2019s not the matches, it\u2019s, uh \u2026 It\u2019s when you feel like you let people down, that\u2019s the tougher thing about it,\u201d he said as the tears started to flow.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have no idea why I\u2019m getting upset. But you go home to your wife and she travels. You see the kids \u2014 not my kids obviously \u2014 and (they ask), \u2018Did you win?\u2019 Just stupid things \u2026 you just feel a bit, you\u2019re not used to losing. That\u2019s probably more of the thing.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t worry about retirement, but it\u2019s just different, isn\u2019t it? So to start losing and stuff like that, it\u2019s scary at the end of the day to know sometimes you\u2019re not good enough and that\u2019s not an easy thing in sport to not be good enough.\u201d<\/p>\n

Evans said Tuesday that the last year has been \u201cequally as difficult\u201d as when he was serving his drugs ban and feared his career was over, but that he would never go back on his decision to play the Olympic Games.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 500 points and winning Washington, that was a great experience. But, and I probably shouldn\u2019t say this as I\u2019m asking for a wild card, but the feeling of going out to play in the quarterfinals with Andy was a lot different to playing in Washington.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s just a fact, and everybody\u2019s behind you at the Olympics, so I never think about it like that. I\u2019ve never woken and I thought, \u2018Jeez, what have you done there?\u2019 It\u2019s always been a really proud moment. If I got a chance to do it again, I\u2019d do it again.\u201d<\/p>\n

After getting into a rare ATP Tour-level event in Dubai in February, where Khachanov dispatched him in straight sets, Evans despaired at his form, saying that \u201cit was a massive eye-opener\u201d after being away from the elite. Ranked No. 154, Evans is a long way from where he was. But even if he doesn\u2019t believe in karma, maybe the tennis gods, who have delivered him a shot at the greatest male player of all time at his home major, do.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s what you play tennis for, isn\u2019t it? To play the top players in the biggest tournaments,\u201d Evans said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really looking forward to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Top photo: Ben Stansall\/AFP via Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Athletic has live coverage from Day 4 at Wimbledon 2025.\u00a0 THE ALL ENGLAND CLUB, LONDON \u2014 This…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":35404,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[3777,62,222,1464,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-35403","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-olympics","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-sports-business","11":"tag-tennis","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114789565815874070","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35403","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35403"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35403\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35403"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35403"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35403"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}