We all know that the likes of Maria Sharapova, Ana Ivanovic, Daniela Hantuchova, Jelena Jankovic are fashionistas in tennis. But what about the men in tennis? Some of them try, the majority don’t care but one just stands head and shoulders about the rest… and he doesn’t need help anymore.
Three of the men were asked about their sense of fashion – Andy Murray, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer. There are probably no prizes for guessing who fits into what category but here is what the three of them had to say.
ANDY MURRAY (who thought it was a rather amusing question to be directed at him): “This is a tough question for me. I don't really know how to answer it. To be honest, I mean, I just like wearing on the court what's comfortable. So long as the products work well, then that's the most important thing for me.
“I mean, adidas, the way they work is they tend to have their they have their own colors, so all of the players wear a fairly similar kit; whereas some of the other companies, you know, it's more sort of individual. So you see that player's sort of style or what they like a little bit more.”
NOVAK DJOKOVIC (who is getting a sense of what to wear): “Andre Agassi definitely revolutionalized the fashion in tennis. He was the first one to dress differently and to have some kind of statement on the court. Well, I have been through a process in my career, as well. I had different dragons and wings on my shirts (smiling).
“But I'm at a different stage right now. Of course I'm very much involved in giving trying to give my input as much as I can to design my own clothes. I'm fortunate to have a really good team of people and designers from Uniqlo Company who represents me the last two years.
“There is various, I will say, inspirations behind the certain designs for different periods of the year depending on color of the surface, depending on the time of the year, depending where we go, color of Serbian flags, so forth and so forth. So there are different sources of inspiration we are trying to put into the design and kind of create something that looks nice on the court.”
ROGER FEDERER (who showed his serious side of the subject and if he ever has doubts he can always turn to close friend Anna Wintour the boss of Vogue): “It's great to see fans wearing the RF (his signature label) cap, you name it, or Nike in general. It's like a tag of approval maybe in a way that they enjoy what I'm wearing. They feel like they're connected to me, which I do feel is the case.
“The hard part is deciding today what I'm going to wear for US Open next year. It's kind of hard, you know, sometimes to put myself in the right mind and mindset to know, Am I going to like, you know, stripes in one and a half years? I'm not sure, you know.
“Right now I maybe do, but maybe one and a half years maybe not so cool. That's the hard part when we work together with Nike. But I really enjoy the process, and it's nice to be part of it rather than just getting stuff and then not liking or loving stuff.
“It has that element where you can be part of it. My advice probably is you've got to make sure you wear the clothes and not the clothes wear you. It's quite simple in a, way but don't wear something you totally feel uncomfortable with, but, you know, take some chances. Play around a bit.
“I felt very uncomfortable in suits when I was younger, so what I just started doing was wearing suits when I was going to dinner. I used to overdress a little bit so I got used to wearing suits. Now wearing a suit is like wearing a track suit for me. So it's all good.”
