The last point of Stan Wawrinka’s professional career began with a missed first serve. Serving at 2-6 in the second-set tiebreak on Tuesday night, facing the first of four match points, the 41-year-old Swiss missed his first delivery and had to play the point off his second. Jiri Lehecka won it, and with it a 7-5, 7-6(2) first-round win at the Swiss Indoors that ended Wawrinka’s 24 years as a professional.
The match. Lehecka, the eighth seed, took a close first set 7-5. Wawrinka, in the draw on a wild card, pushed the second to a tiebreak with the home crowd behind him, but Lehecka ran it 7-2. The match lasted an hour and 51 minutes on Center Court at St. Jakobshalle.
The farewell. The tournament had honored him with a ceremony on Monday evening, the night before he played. After the final point, Wawrinka spoke to the crowd and thanked his team and the people who had been with him through his career. It was his 19th and last appearance at the Swiss Indoors.
Asked how he hoped to be remembered, Wawrinka said the judgment was not his to make. For more than 20 years, he said, his aim had been to give everything in every match out of respect for his opponents, the tournaments and the fans, because that was “the only way you can leave the sport: without any regrets.”
The career. Wawrinka won 16 tour-level titles, three of them majors, and rose to No. 3 in the rankings in 2014. All three of his Grand Slam titles came by beating the world No. 1 in the final, beginning with Rafael Nadal at the 2014 Australian Open and ending with Novak Djokovic at the 2016 US Open, where at 31 he became the oldest men’s champion in New York of the Open Era to that point. He also won Olympic doubles gold with Roger Federer in 2008 and helped Switzerland to its first Davis Cup title in 2014.
He kept winning long after most of his generation had stopped. His 12 tour-level wins since turning 40 in March 2025 are the most by any player after his 40th birthday since the ATP Tour began in 1990, ahead of Ivo Karlovic with nine and Jimmy Connors with eight. Magnus Norman, his longtime coach, who was with him again in his final season, said Wawrinka was liked across the tour because “he treats everyone the same,” from drivers and ball kids to the world No. 1.
What comes next. Lehecka goes on in Basel, and the one-handed backhand that carried Wawrinka to his titles becomes a rarer sight at the top of the men’s game. A player who formally retires cannot simply change his mind; GTN’s retirement rule explainer sets out the notice and drug-testing requirements for any return. His full record is in our Stan Wawrinka profile.
