Roger Federer will start to experience serious rankings repercussions as the season goes on in his absence from the court. 

The 40-year-old legend was one of a number of players to benefit from the ATP rankings freeze that came along with the pandemic affected season.

But after not playing since Wimbledon and sitting out until at least the end of 2021, Federer is set to begin falling down the men’s tennis ladder.

Currently ranked at number nine in the world, Federer will fall to tenth the week starting 11th October as past points drop from the rankings. He will drop a total of 480 ranking points: 300 from Indian Wells 2019 and 180 from Shanghai 2019.

From there, Federer will be ahead of Felix Auger-Aliassime by just 22 ranking points, and ahead of Hubert Hurkacz by 64.

This will put Federer right on the edge of dropping out of the top-10 for the first time since January 2017, when the Swiss was ranked 17th before winning the Australian Open.

Come the end of October, Federer will lose the 500 rankings points he defends from the 2019 Basel Open, plus 400 more from the 2019 ATP Finals.

That will see Federer fall to his lowest ranking for over 20 years, 18th. The last time the 20-time Slam champion was ranked that low was on 4th June 2001.