That’s the view of former Olympic tennis champion Marc Rosset.
Roger Federer began 2018 with the 10th Grand Slam title defence of his career by retaining his Australian Open crown.
He went onto win the Rotterdam Open, his 97th career title, before going onto lose the world No 1 spot after disappointing displays at Indian Wells and the Miami Open.
Federer opted to skip the clay court season once again in order to best prepare for Wimbledon but it did not go to plan as he exited at the quarter-finals stage to Kevin Anderson.
His preparation for SW19 saw him win the Stuttgart Open but lose in the final in Halle.
And in the last Grand Slam of the year, Federer suffered a shock early exit to John Millman at the US Open to heighten his struggles.
And Rosset believes his lack of matches against the best in the world is the reason he’s been underperforming.
“The game was not necessarily in place,” Rosset told L’Equipe, speaking after Federer secured his ninth Swiss Indoors title last week.
“He suffered against [Gilles] Simon, who played well, with a very large number of mistakes.
“For much of the tournament, he could not do what he wanted. There were beautiful sequences and less good passages.
“He may be suffering from a lack of competition over the year.
“Between Indian Wells and Wimbledon, between March and June, he did not play against a top 10 after his final against Del Potro at Indian Wells.
“No top 20 in Stuttgart, no top 30 in Halle.”
Federer is now preparing to play in the Paris Masters this week as he looks to close the gap on world No 1 Rafael Nadal and world No 2 Novak Djokovic.
The Swiss veteran has been handed a tough draw where he could come up against the likes of Kevin Anderson, Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal in the latter rounds.
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