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January 28, 2006
Federer on road to joining greats
By Martin Flanagan, The Age
I SAW Roger Federer live on Wednesday night and found myself
listening to the sound of his racquet when he sliced the ball, the
tingle of the strings as they held the ball for that fraction
longer and sent it spinning low across the net to stop and
prop.
For a time, playing that shot seemed to interest him more than
anything else. I couldn't help but wonder if you were as good as
Federer and kept on winning and winning, wouldn't you have to start
finding other ways of amusing yourself while you were out
there?
I would classify Federer's game against Nikolay Davydenko as
brilliant to begin with, good thereafter when it really mattered
— i.e., the tie-breakers — but somewhat becalmed in
between.
Afterwards, when Jim Courier suggested to him it had not been
one of his best games, Federer praised Davydenko and said he had
played fantastic tennis. "When I scramble, it is usually because my
opponent is playing well," he said. Perhaps the gap between Federer
and the rest is not nearly as big as is thought.
Earlier in the week, his customary calm deserted him when he
said the media were getting on his nerves asking him questions
like, "Wouldn't it be good if you lost a set?"
I reckon I would get irritated if every time I did three or four
hours' work, I then had to appear before a tribunal and answer
questions about it. Any question that comes to mind. I'm told
Federer gives news conferences in four languages.
I keep wondering why I find him so much more captivating than
any other tennis player I've seen. I never saw John McEnroe live,
not until he was — in terms of the game — an old man.
Then he looked quaint, this funny little fellow with a mass of
curls. I didn't really appreciate McEnroe properly until I read his
biography and saw exactly what sort of mind was at work.
By the time I saw Stefan Edberg, he had become the game's
Swedish aristocrat. He lost the 1993 final in tired fashion to
Courier, who struck me as a more cerebral version of Our
Lleyton.
Andre Agassi I admired for all sorts of reasons, not least for
his correction of Russian Yevgeny Kafelnikov who, flushed with the
ideals of his country's post-communist nouveau riche, arrived in
his private jet and declared male tennis players deserved more
money. "I think Yevgeny ought to use his prizemoney to buy himself
a little perspective," said Agassi drily. Agassi was tennis'
Honourable Warrior.
Then there was Pete Sampras, whom I saw play when he was a boy.
I eventually stopped watching, notwithstanding the long trail of
titles he left behind him.
Sampras had style but there was something essentially dull about
him. The American artist Edward Hopper once did a famous painting
of an all-night bar that went to the loneliness of contemporary
existence. Subsequently, a poster maker put the figures of Elvis,
Marilyn Monroe and James Dean sitting isolated and alone around the
cafe bar.
I would put Sampras with them. He was the kid who was good at
tennis, made good money that way. Like he otherwise might have
playing pool.
This week, Courier remarked that a difference between Sampras
and Federer is that once Sampras had a break in a set, he did not
push for a second break. "He just slapped the ball around a bit."
Perhaps that's what I sense in Federer. He's always alive to the
nuance of the game; that's why he can surprise.
So you get those moments when the game is locked in a pattern,
one whose terms put Federer on equal footing with his opponent, the
ball ricocheting from one end of the court to the other in a blink
of the eye, forehand to forehand.
The finest misjudgment will lose the point and you expect it to
be won by attrition and — bang! — Federer tries and plays
a winner down the line and everyone applauds excitedly because no
one saw it coming.
Federer is somehow mesmerising to look at, dark good looks, easy
walk to his seat between games, his headband a colour that my wife
describes as apple green. Not many men would wear that colour. It's
soft.
But it's also part of what you see when he serves at about 208
km/h and engages in exchanges of ferociously contained power and
precision from the back of the court. It's the mix, the balance
about Federer, that is so attractive, not to mention his sporting
elan.
His opponents constantly seek to contain and frustrate him, he
constantly seeks to escape and play the game on his terms. For most
of his game against Davydenko, he had twice as many winners while
being equal on overall points.
Federer is now at a most important phase of his career. His
reputation, I would suggest, is not quite secure. If he can
continue as he has for another few years, tennis lovers will one
day speak of him as soccer people talk of Cruyff and Best. As one
of the magic ones.
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