The true reason why Roger Federer left Nike has now been disclosed by his agent

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Roger Federer is one of the most iconic names to have ever played the game of tennis, and he remains one of the most respected figures that the game has ever seen.

Very few can boast the elegance on a tennis court that Federer showcased in an era when he competed with Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray for the game’s biggest prizes.

Federer recently picked the best five tennis players in history, which is strange considering no list should ever be complete without the Swiss star’s name being included.

Federer has been suggesting that the courts are slower in the modern era, and now, it would appear that it’s not the only reason he’s going to be in the news.

Recently, his agent and mentor, Tony Godsick, sat down with Andy Roddick on his Served podcast and lifted the lid on the time when Federer chose to walk away from a huge sponsorship deal with Nike.

• READ MORE: Roger Federer shares how often he plays tennis now he’s retired

Tony Godsick shares real reason Roger Federer left Nike

To real Federer aficionados, it’s not a secret that he famously stopped being represented by Nike in 2018, with claims at the time that he walked away from the sports brand.

However, Godsick has suggested that it was more the other way around, with Nike choosing to stop their sponsorship of Federer instead.

He said on the Served podcast: “He didn’t leave Nike. Nike left him. We were trying to re-sign, and they chose not to re-sign. He would have stayed. It’s true. The contract was ending in February 2018, a 10-year deal we started in 2008.

“I spent one whole year, all the way until it ended, trying to renew it.

“Yes, I understand that it’s hard to decide or place a value on someone who is already branded and 36 years old. Most people don’t play past 30 or whatever it is, and here he is at 36.

“But we had history, and we did a lot of great things together. I thought I would show up on campus at Nike in January 2017 to try and begin what is in essence a 13-month process to get a new deal.”

At the time, Federer had not won a major for four years and Godsick elaborated that he held several meetings with Nike to try and convince them.

Godsick pushed for a deal that rewarded Federer for having the most Grand Slam titles in history at that point, claiming that his client had already auditioned and knew how to sell Nike products across the world.

Federer is close to Anna Wintour, who was the editor for Vogue and fashion is something that he’s been big on throughout his career as a tennis player.

In the end, Federer created his own brand called RF1 but it was after he went and won the Australian Open and Wimbledon that Godsick thought Nike would come begging.

He continued: “So we go from no majors to winning three while I need to negotiate. He is giving me all the goods and I can’t get it done.

“I went up to campus on the last day of the contract and I will leave what happened in the meeting to what happened in the meeting, but I left and went to the airport without a deal. I was super upset. I was on a flight from Minneapolis back to Cleveland and I remember walking in the airport like I can’t believe this. I was going to go down as the agent who could not renew not only the greatest guy but the greatest tennis player in history.
So I went out and called him and I remember saying let’s go out to the marketplace.

“Everyone was like ‘yeah right, no thank you’. I remember one brand said he is already branded with Nike, we’re not interested.

“He’s had a headband on with the swoosh. Another said we would like to do it but we have to wait until next year because this is the year of our founder.”

How Anna Wintour helped Roger Federer earn Uniqlo deal

With Godsick concerned over what to do in the best interests of Federer, a chat with Wintour actually ended up making the player richer than Nike had ever made him, with the Vogue bigwig setting up a meeting with their president Mr Yanai.

Uniqlo paid Federer a staggering $300 million in a 10-year deal without any performance or appearances clauses included, according to The Times of India.

Godsick continues: “And I will never forget I tried to meet the founder of Uniqlo and Novak had already been with them, so they were already in tennis, but I could not get to him.

“Then Anna Wintour, who I owe a tremendous amount, I was having breakfast with her in New York City and I said I need a favour. Do you know Mr. Yanai, I can’t get to him?

“She said I know him. So she sent a note and 12 hours later I had a message back from the assistant of Mr. Uni saying that he understands you want to meet about Roger Federer. And it said can you meet him on this date in Japan for 30 minutes.

“I called Roger and said what do I do? He said you go to Japan and meet him for 30 minutes!

“I went and it was a great meeting. I explained the situation. He knew what was going on. The first thing he asked me was who else are you here to see and I told him nobody else. He said I will give you more time than 30 minutes and then he asked a really good question.

“He said are here to use me? He said we had another athlete from Nike whose contract was over, they came down and we made an offer and then Nike matched it. So are you here to do the same thing?

“I said if you meet the terms of what Roger wants to do and the vision we have and aren’t concerned with him playing for too much longer and we can do the fashion stuff, then it’s up to you.”

The rest is history and Federer ended up working with Uniqlo and naturally, the question Godsick gets asked is whether he and Federer were truly upset with Nike.

He finalised: “So everyone says, are you upset with Nike? And we say no, we are happy with Nike because if they didn’t behave this way, Roger would still be there and they probably would still have done a good job, but I’m not sure we’d be having this Roger silhouette.”

The 10 richest tennis players in history with a surprise number one

Given the details of this deal situation with Nike and Uniqlo coming to light, it’s no surprise that Federer sits high on the list of richest tennis players in history in second place.

The number one is perhaps surprising with Romanian player Ion Tiriac taking the mantle with the billionaire spending time as a tennis player between 1958 and 1979.

He also represented Romania at ice hockey and featured at the Winter Olympics in 1964.

Most of his money came from life after tennis when he created the Tiriac Group which was founded after the fall of communism in Romania, and he’s also got interests in real estate, auto, financial services and other things too.

The list released by Insider Media earlier this year also includes Rafael Nadal, Serena Williams and Andy Murray.