Tokyo Olympics: Masterton tennis medallist reveals he considered hanging up his racket

Wednesday, 4 August 2021

Marcus Daniell won the bronze medal with doubles partner Michael Venus at Tokyo.

An Olympic medal is an incredible feat for any athlete, but for one of our tennis stars, it was a peak so high above recent lows, it left him an emotional wreck.

After 14 years toiling on the international professional circuit, Marcus Daniell was seriously considering the end of his career after being dropped by his tour doubles partner earlier in the season.

The emotions of winning New Zealand’s first tennis medal with Kiwi doubles-partner Michael Venus had at times been overwhelming.

“It’s been an absolute peak experience for me because I’m so proud to represent New Zealand and to have an achievement like this on the pinnacle of the world’s sporting stage has been incredibly special,” he said on Wednesday from Washington DC where he is preparing for the US Open.

Daniell and Venus show off their ‘metalware’ after their medal ceremony.

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Daniell was a prodigy in his youth going up against some of Wairarapa’s best players.

After they won the bronze medal match against the highly fancied Americans, Venus joked with Daniell that he should have a sponsorship deal with Kleenex, given the tears Daniell shed.

Daniell said it was a reflection of what it meant to him as a Kiwi, but also his personal climb back out of some dark places in which he found himself earlier this year.

The 31-year-old said he recently had the first serious thoughts in many years over whether he wanted to continue with tennis after this season.

“I’ve had a really rough couple of months on tour. Heartbreaking results, and a guy I’d been playing with for a year-and-half told me at the start of the grass court season that we were going to be done after Wimbledon.”

“The contrast in going from a pretty low place to such a high place has just been a little overwhelming.”

Following last week’s success, he’s now considering whether the next Olympics in Paris in 2024 should be a goal.

“Now that we’ve had a taste of some metalware, I’m hungry for more.”

When the Kiwi doubles pair and bronze medallist trampolinist Dylan Schmidt were given a haka tribute by the New Zealand team, it hit Daniell emotionally again.

“That completely broke me again. I lost it.”

Venus, left, and Daniell react after defeating the team from the United States during the men's doubles bronze medal match.

He said being away from New Zealand 10 to 11 months of the year, he really missed his country and the haka touched him enormously.

“To have that culture and that spirit being screamed in your face, it was so powerful.”

Since 2010, Masterton-born player has won five ATP doubles titles, but never a masters.

“Only within ourselves can we know how hard we’ve worked.”

He said he’s had some great career highlights, but he admitted that there had been some frustration that there hadn’t been more “peak moments”.

It felt as though this Olympic success has validated all these efforts

“I’ve been working towards this since I was a kid and this is what I have to show for it.”

Daniell grew up as a tennis prodigy in Wairarapa when as a 10-year-old he used to regularly beat the best senior men in the region.

He said support has flooded in from his home community.

“I hope it brings joy to the people I grew up playing with who shaped me as a young player.

“I’ve been having messages from Cilla Paulik throughout the whole Olympics who was my first ever tennis coach from when I was four or five.”

Daniell now has to focus on the US Open in a few weeks and competing for New Zealand in the Davis Cup tie.

He is on the ATP Players Council with the likes of Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, which takes up a lot of time.

He runs his own charity, High Impact Athletes and is also studying for his masters in philosophy.

Daniell and Venus’ path to medal glory

The doubles team had a fairly easy path to the quarterfinals, taking on a couple of singles specialists from Belarus in the first round.

In the “hard-fought” quarter-finals they defeated Colombians Juan-Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah 6-3 3-6 10-7.

The loss to Croatians Marin Cilic and Ivan Dodig 6-2 6-2 in the semi-final was tough but they managed to pick themselves up mentally. The pair from Croatia went on to take silver while another pair of Croatian players, Mate Pavic and Nikola Mektic, won the gold medal.

The Kiwis defeated the American pair of Austin Krajicek and Tennys Sandgren 7-6 6-2 on court No 1 at the Ariake Tennis Centre in the bronze medal match in one hour 48 minutes.

”It was a sweet finish to a very intense couple of weeks,” Daniell said.

“It’s so special how the Olympics and everything about the Olympics just brings people together and gets people exciting. It all feels crazy and surreal and I think that’s going to continue for a while.”