2013 was Roger Federer’s most difficult year since the beginning of his career – with back problems, uncharacteristic defeats, unbroken runs that ended, and a drop in the world ranking from two to six. But he still reached three finals and won his 77th major title at the grass-court tournament in Halle. And in the fall, at the indoor tournaments in Basel (final) and Paris (semi-final), things improved again quickly. This meant that, in the end, he qualified safely for the World Tour Finals in London for the 12th time in a row, where, thanks to wins over Richard Gasquet and Juan Martin Del Potro, he reached the semi-finals for the 11th time, in which he lost to Rafael Nadal. Afterwards he was looking forward to the forthcoming season with due confidence.