RF Tennis News 2017

Tennis: Roger Federer just two wins away from capping a miraculous comeback

By Simon Cambers | The National
24 January 2017


WHEN Roger Federer began his comeback at the Australian Open nine days ago, he knew he was capable of producing some good tennis but was unsure for how long he would be able to maintain it.

Yesterday, the 35-year-old answered his own question and with it, moved to within two wins of what would be one of the most remarkable grand slam victories in recent memory.

It is four and a half years since Federer won the most recent of his 17 grand slam titles and the odds against him adding to it are still strong, with Stan Wawrinka up first and then, perhaps, Rafael Nadal in the final.

Federer should have been playing Andy Murray in the quarter-finals, of course, a task that might have been too much for him so soon into his comeback after six months out with a knee injury.

But Murray’s defeat by Mischa Zverev opened a door for him and Federer duly dispatched the German 6-1, 7-5, 6-2 yesterday, winning the first five games in 12 minutes.

Despite going a break down early in the second set, Federer hit back quickly, moving sweetly and hammering numerous forehand winners past the on-rushing Zverev.

“I think winning back-to-back matches in best-of-five sets against quality, great players, that was for me the big question mark, if I could do that so early in my comeback,” a relaxed Federer said.

“I felt I was always going to be dangerous on any given day in a match situation. But obviously as the tournament would progress, maybe I would fade away with energy, that kind of stuff.

“I think now that I’m in the semis, feeling as good as I am, playing as good as I am, that’s a huge surprise to me. If someone would have told me I’d play in the semis against Stan, never would I have called that one for me. For Stan, yes, but not for me.”

Now he is, though, the mindset changes and he will take an 18-3 record into his semi-final with Wawrinka, who dispatched Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 7-6, 6-4, 6-2 yesterday.

Fourth seed Wawrinka has won a grand slam title in each of the past three years, passing Federer in the rankings after the seven-times Wimbledon champion cut his season short last summer.

The dynamic between the two may have changed, somewhat, but there is a gleam in Federer’s eye and he is excited about what he’s achieved and may go on to achieve before this fortnight is out.

And the faster conditions this year, both the court surface and lighter tennis balls, is also playing in his favour.

“The older generation, anything before 2005, are used to faster courts,” he said. “From that moment on, it was a switch but we had to grow up in faster conditions. Maybe there’s less thinking going on (so) you just play with instinct. That’s maybe what older guys can do very well because they don’t get frustrated in faster conditions. Maybe it has helped me, too, in my comeback, no doubt about it.”

The last time they played each other, in the semi-finals of the 2015 US Open, Federer won in straight sets. But his 31-year-old opponent, who won the US Open last September, did win when they played at the 2015 French Open.

“For sure now I’m more confident with myself,” Wawrinka said. “When I step on the court, doesn’t matter who I play, I know what I have to do if I want to win. Against Roger, it’s always special because he’s so good. He’s the best player of all time.”

The match that transcends tennis

There is sport and then there is Roger playing Rafa in the arguably the most significant match in tennis history.





By Alix Ramsay| The AO 
29 January, 2017


There is sport and then there is sport.

Your normal, run-of-the-mill sport is still gripping, it can still be the centre of your world for the 90 minutes of the football match, the five days of the cricket test, but it is soon over and gone.

And then there is sport. Those are the moments, the matches and the characters that live with you forever.

In countless countries and on countless occasions, I have been stuck in strange towns trying to get to unknown addresses and my only mode of transport is a taxi driver who speaks no English. I wave my arms, I point wildly at maps; he stares at me blankly. And then, as I jabber on, the penny drops: I am from the UK. The taxi driver smiles knowingly. “Bobby Charlton,” he says. “George Best.” And I know everything will be all right. Contact has been made. The international language of sport has worked its magic.

As the hours tick away before Sunday night’s final, the world is tuning in. Those who are tennis fans would have tuned in anyway, but there are people out there who will watch this time not because they know anything about tennis but because Roger is playing Rafa. They may not know a topspin lob from a backhand volley but they know Rog and Raf.

Going back to my travels, I have met many a stranger who knows little of tennis but who tries to strike up a conversation. “I’ve seen that chap, what’s his name? Been No.1 for ages? Oh, who is he? Won Wimbledon…” They could mean anyone because they have no interest in tennis. But if you mention Roger Federer or Rafa Nadal, their eyes light up. They know all about them.

Roger and Rafa are not tennis players, they are not even tennis legends – they are sports legends. They are like Pele, Tendulkar, Ballesteros. They need no introduction and no explanation – they just are. And even the ever-humble Rafa is fully aware of the situation. He knows the importance of this final; he knows what it means to himself and to Roger and he knows what it means to the sport. The like of their rivalry will probably never be seen again.

“[The rivalry] was amazing for me, for me and I think for tennis, too,” Nadal said. “Is the combination of two different styles that makes the matches really special.
“Is different way to play tennis. Both of us, I think, having a lot of good success with these two different styles. I feel that this rivalry go not only in the tennis world. People from outside of our world talks about this, and that's good for our sport. Is good that we are back there.”

The final promises to have something for everyone.

For the stats geek, there is the record book to consider. Federer is hoping to extend his record haul of Grand Slam titles to No.18. That would stretch the gap between him and Nadal to four major trophies.

Nadal is hoping to collect his 15th big trophy and so overtake Pete Sampras’s tally (they are tied on 14 apiece at the moment). He is also hoping to become only the third man after Roy Emerson and Rod Laver to complete a second career Grand Slam (win all four majors at least twice).

For the purist, there is the contrast in styles to analyse and dissect: the artistry and fluidity of Federer’s game versus the more muscular, attritional approach of Nadal. Precision v athleticism, attack v defence, forecourt aggression v baseline aggression. And as for the sheer bravery of both men in moments of crisis – neither man will blink in the face of the oncoming truck.

For those of a more frivolous nature, there is the battle of the immaculate Fed against the athletic Raf. As the new saying goes: horses sweat, gentlemen perspire but Roger merely glows. Across the net there is Raf begging the ballkids to mop the pools of sweat on the baseline where he has just been standing. There is the cool Federer easing into his service action as if he was stirring his afternoon cup of tea; there is the hyperactive Nadal adjusting his undies, mopping his face, pushing back his hair, touching his ears, his nose and his forehead – and then doing it all again – before settling in to receive that Federer service.

It is their ninth Grand Slam final, their 22nd final in all and their 35th meeting in a rivalry that goes back 13 years. Between them, they have 31 Grand Slam singles titles and have been world No.1 for 443 weeks (that’s more than eight-and-a-half years). These are two players the like of which we will not see again. And now they are playing each other again for a major trophy.

There are moments in sport that you simply cannot miss, moments that you will talk about forever. Where were you when England won the World Cup? When Don Bradman smashed the Poms for 309 in a day at Leeds in the Ashes? When Shane Warne bowled his ‘Ball of the Century’ to Mike Gatting at Lords? When Australia won the Americas Cup? When Michael Phelps won his 23rd Olympic gold medal? When Usain Bolt broke the 100m world record?

Where will you be when Roger plays Rafa for the AO 2017 title?

Why Federer's 18th Slam "stands alone"

Wimbledon.com looks at why Roger Federer's most recent Grand Slam win may just have been his finest...


 


By Steve Tignor | Wimbledon.com
Wednesday 1 February 2017


“This one stands alone,” Roger Federer said after his five-set win over Rafael Nadal in the Australian Open final on Sunday. “This is in its own category.”

You can understand why Federer, despite having already won 17 Grand Slam titles - three more than any other male player - would feel that way about his 18th.


Federer's 18 Grand Slam titles



To start, he’s 35 years old. The last man to win a major at that age or older was Ken Rosewall in 1972. It had also been five years since Federer’s last Slam win, coming at The Championships 2012.

During that time he had been a runner-up on three occasions and a semi-finalist on four; but in the end, a fellow member of the Big 4 had always stood in his way. Nadal, in particular, was an immovable roadblock. Since beating Rafa in the 2007 Wimbledon final, Federer had lost their last six matches at majors.

“I said that before the finals: If I were to win against Rafa, it would be super special and very sweet because I haven’t beaten him in a Grand Slam final for a long, long time,” Federer said.

Even before he met Nadal, though, Federer’s run in Melbourne had been special, and especially difficult. It was the first time that he had beaten three Top 10 players—Tomas Berdych, Kei Nishikori, and Stan Wawrinka—to reach a major final, and the first time he needed survive three five-set matches to win a Slam. In each of them, Federer lost the fourth set before bouncing back to win the fifth against a younger player.

Part of that, you suspect, was the value of his name and reputation. Whatever Federer’s age may be, and however well his opponent may be playing, it will never be easy for guys who have grown up in his shadow to believe they can finish him off. Even Nadal, who has beaten him 23 times, wavered with a 3-1 lead in the fifth set.

As intimidating as it may be to face Federer and his legend, he admitted to having very human doubts about his chances this time. Since his last Australian Open title, in 2010, Federer had lost in the semi-finals there five times. This year, as he watched his two-set lead over Wawrinka slip away in their semi, his mind flashed back to those defeats.

“At some point you reach a limit,” Federer said, “and you just can’t go beyond that. You can play them tight. You might win one of them. You just can’t win back to back.”

“Midway through the fourth [set], when I realized my game was fading, Stan was having the upper hand on the baseline, I thought, I guess that’s what I was always talking about. Things turn for the worse, you don’t know why.”


 

This time, though, when Federer found a way to turn them around for the better.

At 2-2 in the fifth set, Wawrinka reached break point, only to make an unforced error with his favorite shot, his backhand.

But how unforced was that error, exactly? Federer, it seemed, helped draw it out of Wawrinka by hitting the ball higher to Stan’s backhand than he normally would.

“I was a little bit surprised,” Wawrinka said. “I didn’t go back quickly enough when he came a little bit higher with his backhand. I was expecting him to be really aggressive on that shot and he completely changed.”

We hear a lot about Federer the artist and the athlete, but behind both of those is Federer the tactician. He’s versatile enough to change things up from one shot to the next, without having to completely change his game plan. That’s how he began his turnaround against Wawrinka, and he would do the same thing in the fifth set against Nadal.

Since the beginning of their rivalry 13 years ago, Federer had struggled to make his one-handed backhand stand up to Rafa’s topspin forehand. On Sunday, as the deciding set began, Federer was still struggling. Nadal has his heavy ground strokes locked in, and he was up an early service break.

But with Rafa serving at 2-3, Federer again changed the trajectory on his backhand. When Nadal hit a heavy loop, Federer sent one back even higher. With Rafa backed off the baseline, Federer jumped on his next backhand for a game-changing, and eventually match-changing, crosscourt winner.

“I had opportunities early on in the fifth to get back on level terms,” Federer said. “I could have been left disappointed there and accepted that fact. I kept on fighting. I kept on believing, like I did all match long today, that there was a possibility I could win this match.”

“I think that’s what made me play my best tennis at the very end of the match.”

Federer saved his best for the end of the match, and he saved some of his best tennis for the end—or close to the end—of his career. His most memorable and satisfying win, the one that, as he says, “stands alone,” came after two decades on tour. First against Wawrinka and then against Nadal, Federer reached his limit, and found out he could go beyond it.

“Can Federer win another major?” Since his last major title, at Wimbledon in 2012, this question has been asked more than any other in tennis. Now it never needs to be asked again.

Roger Federer, as he proved in Melbourne, can always win another Grand Slam.