RF Tennis News 2020

"He is so composed mentally. He's always able to sift through problems..."
-@Paul_Annacone

One of @RogerFederer's underrated traits? Winning ugly. pic.twitter.com/bvlHG63kmQ

— TENNIS (@Tennis) May 4, 2020

Lil_Jay wrote:Roger just released a statement on twitter regarding additional op on his right knee and indicates 2021 for his return.

Get well soon King!

pic.twitter.com/zXnR7gAZQA

— Roger Federer (@rogerfederer) June 10, 2020

In 2001, I went to Biel, Switzerland to interview a 20-year-old Roger Federer and his team, including the late Peter Carter.

It was 2 months after his win over Pete Sampras at Wimbledon.

Just found and posted the article, if you fancy a read - https://t.co/kO8h9jjs5W

— David Law (@DavidLawTennis) July 6, 2020

  Federer Comes of Age (2001)

David Law
July 06, 2020

A few days after the 2001 US Open, I travelled to the Swiss National Tennis Centre in Biel, Switzerland to interview 20-year-old Roger Federer and his team, including the late Peter Carter, for an article that you can read below. The idea was to look back at his win over Pete Sampras, get a sense of who Federer was, and what he might be about to do next.

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(September 2001)

Pete Sampras barely knew what to do. Approaching the net on Wimbledon's Center Court as a beaten man for only the second time in nine years, Sampras stared across the court to where a young man, ten years his junior, lay on the grass crying.

Roger Federer had just come of age. Seconds earlier, the 19-year-old Swiss had sent another majestic, and this time lethal forehand flashing past the seven-time champion. The American had thrown the proverbial kitchen sink at Federer but the youngster had sent it back with interest, and as they shook hands, it seemed Sampras had finally found a successor worthy of carrying his baton of greatness into the new millennium.

Ever since he humbled the most prolific Grand Slam winner in history, memories of that day have been on show at the Swiss National Tennis Centre, an hour's train ride from Federer's home in Basel. Kids half his size and half his age fly around the courts, pummeling forehands and hoping to follow in his footsteps. Posters with his picture adorn the walls, and the red shirt he wore at the US Open hangs on display in a glass cabinet. That thrilling five set win over Sampras made him a household name in Switzerland and turned heads around the world, but the Roger Federer story has only just begun.

He still lives at the family home with father Robert and mother Lynette (who works in the accreditation department of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors in Basel), and first picked up a racquet at the age of three. At 14 he had to make a choice between his two favorite sports - tennis and soccer. A fanatical supporter of Basel's football team, he decided to make soccer a hobby, and tennis his career.

One of the first people to work with him at that age was Dutchman Sven Groeneveld, former coach to Greg Rusedski, Nicolas Kiefer and Tommy Haas.

"He had the ability to hit all the shots," remembers Groeneveld. "But he was taking full swings, hitting the ball hard and low over the net, and missing. I decided to put another net on top of the existing one to make him put more height on his strokes. It forced him to hit a heavy spin and get some depth, but he got upset. 'I don't want to play like this,' he told me. But once I'd explained to him that it was a shot he needed in a match, he accepted it."

Right from the beginning it was obvious that this was no ordinary boy. Tall, athletic and with a bob of brown curls on his head, he played dashing, daring, wonderfully cavalier tennis, hitting shots that few players could dream up on their most wildly imaginative day. He even gave one of them a name - the 'Cliffhanger'.

"He hits it as hard as he can, but with so much spin that it drops like a rock and goes in," explained Groeneveld.

Even for a professional player, it's almost unplayable. Basically, the ball flies towards you, swerving right to left, hits the ground, turns completely the opposite direction, and then springs up at you like a dog that hasn't seen its owner for a month (I know this because he hit three 'Cliffhangers' in my general direction by way of illustration. The first left me swinging at thin air, the second whistled past my ear, and the third hit me smack in the face).

Even as a teenager, Federer earned comparisons to the very best players in the world, including Pete Sampras. They both used the same Wilson racquet, both played with a classical, languid style, and both moved around the court like a cat.

But Federer was still just a boy, and an immature one at that. His match against Sampras at Wimbledon would later lead on-lookers to describe him as 'Borg-like', but as a junior, he was nothing of the sort.

"I was very surprised when people started to compare me to Borg because I always had the feeling that I the was the opposite to him," said Federer. "When I was young, I was really carrying on like an idiot on the court. My parents were going nuts in the stands. It was ridiculous. My father was saying 'just relax, don't freak out', but I was convinced that I knew best."

At junior level it didn't seem to make much difference to his results. He was so good that he could compete with, and beat, virtually anyone who crossed his path. Even when things got tight, his natural talent would see him through.

Rene Stauffer, tennis correspondent for Swiss Newspaper Tages Anzeiger, vividly remembers the first time he saw Federer play.

"I was stunned by three things," said Stauffer. "The power and pureness of his shots, the terrible way he behaved after mistakes - he threw racquets and cursed all the time - and his ability to win even if things went wrong."

The match he had watched, against Lleyton Hewitt at the World Youth Cup in Zurich in the summer of 1996, was played before anyone had really heard of Federer, but the Swiss saved a match point to win it 7-6 in the third set. It began what now looks likely to be one of the next great rivalries in men's tennis.

In 1998, Federer ended the year as the No.1 junior in the world and won the Wimbledon Boys singles and doubles titles. Three days after those triumphs at the All England Club, he wandered into the press room at the Swiss Open in Gstaad, clutching a multi-colored mobile telephone that looked as if it belonged in a cartoon. He sat down to talk to the Swiss journalists, and the next day, at just 16 years of age, he made his professional debut. He was a boy in a man's world, and to Federer it was all just a big game.

The Swiss media though, were already wondering if this might be the next Boris Becker. They'd seen the excitement generated by Becker's Wimbledon win as a 17-year-old, and fancied some of the same.

But while Becker was already a man at 17, Federer wasn't even close to full maturity. He showed glimpses of his talent in 1999 to break into the top 100, but as he entered his 20th year, he still hadn't made the splash that some people expected. While Hewitt rose consistently, eventually winning the US Open and finishing the year as the No.1 player in the world in 2001, Federer's form was hit and miss, and the pressure began to build.

"Why do I lose all the close matches?" he asked desperately, after a three set tussle with Jiri Novak in Monte Carlo had gone against him in 2000.

Other tough losses followed. Andrei Medvedev beat him in Rome, Arnaud di Pasquale denied him the bronze medal at the Sydney Olympics, and perhaps most painfully, Thomas Enqvist took victory in their five set final in Basel - his home town event.

It was apparent that Federer needed more than just natural talent to fully realize his potential. He would play irresistible tennis for a set and a half, establish a lead but often lose his concentration, his mind and then the match. If he did grind his way through, he invariably used up so much physical and mental energy in the process, that there was nothing left in the tank for the next day.

Two things needed to happen. First, he needed to calm down on court. When he played, it seemed that every shot had to be perfect, otherwise he would lose his temper. He spent so much energy shouting into the sky, cursing every missed shot and flinging his racquet around, that when it really mattered, he had no reserves to call on. It was fabulously entertaining to watch, but enormously draining for him.

"I think that I have finally realized," said Federer, with a grin. "My coaches, Peter Carter before, and Peter Lundgren now, told me that throwing my racquet, getting pissed off and screaming didn't help my game, but I just didn't agree with them. I had the feeling that I had to release my anger somehow and I always told myself that I play better when I do. Now I realize that it is better when I show less emotions, concentrate more on my game and lose less energy."

These days, he releases his excess energy off court instead. He and Lundgren play video games and watch movies together, and for the Swedish 36-year-old, the challenge of keeping Federer occupied off the court is almost as important as fine-tuning his groundstrokes.

"It's a full-time job to keep him entertained," said Lundgren, who reached No.25 in the world as a player. "That's why during the Ericsson Open in Miami, we moved to South Beach. We could go down to the beach, take a swim, get in the car, play loud music, and he could scream. You have to let him."

Secondly, Lundgren knew that Federer needed to be physically stronger. Just like Sampras at 19, he needed to grow into his body, so they enlisted the help of physical trainer Pierre Paganini. Having worked with a variety of players, including Marc Rosset and the Maleeva sisters, Paganini knew what made tennis players tick.

"There were two objectives," he said. "The first objective was to make him faster, stronger, and to have more endurance. The second was to use those qualities at the right moment on the court.”

Federer's previous coach, Australian Peter Carter had worked with him from the age of 11, all the way through his 18th birthday, before Carter passed the reigns onto Lundgren. The task of nurturing a young man through adolescence was sometimes a difficult one, but the pair have remained close friends and Carter feels proud when he sees what Federer has achieved, on and off the court.

"He definitely wasn't the kind of guy that would hit 20 cross court forehands and it was difficult to come up with something new for him every time, but I've seen an improvement in him," said Carter. “It's nice to see how he has developed. He's maturing as player and a person. I've never heard people talk bad about him. He can be a pain, but he has a good heart."

Working like a dog off the court, and staying calm on it, the 'Federer Express' quickly gathered momentum, and in February 2001, it went into overdrive.  Claiming the first title of his career in Milan, Federer was named the ATP Player of the Month for February. He won 14 of 16 matches, and led Switzerland almost single-handedly to victory over the United States in the Davis Cup in Basel.

He even began to look different. A member of the ATP's New Balls Please marketing campaign and now a Davis Cup hero with an ATP title to his name, his wide eyed fascination with tour life had been replaced by the serenity of someone who looked utterly comfortable in his surroundings. He wore a pony-tail, a head scarf wrapped around his forehead during matches, and a look of newly-developed maturity.

Coming into Wimbledon, with a Roland Garros quarterfinal appearance under his belt, Federer was determined to show what he could do on grass. Despite winning the Boys singles three years earlier, he'd lost in the first round at the All England Club the two previous years and there were question marks over his ability to serve and volley on grass.

Against Yevgeny Kafelnikov the previous year, Federer had become so discouraged watching returns whistle past him in the opening game that he tried to play the Russian, one of the best baseliners in the world, from the back of the court. It didn't work, and was never likely to. On this surface  he needed to fight his battles from the net, no matter what.

"The problem is that if you stay back on grass, it doesn't really matter how bad the other guy's return is, it's still tough to dig it out," acknowledged Federer. "So you serve and volley to make the other guy at least hit a good return."

That was the theory, but as Lundgren explained, it took a while for Federer to get to grips with forcibly charging the net on every ball.

"When he first started practising volleys he hated it, he wasn't good at it," said Lundgren. "It was like there were sharks inside the service box. But we practised, and now the sharks are gone."  

Proving the point, Federer fought his way past Xavier Malisse in the second round, swept aside Jonas Bjorkman in the third, and then saw the name of Pete Sampras written next to his own in the draw.

Having looked up to the American for as long as he could remember, this was a dream come true for Federer.

It also marked the first time in his career that he would play on the Center Court at Wimbledon.

"For me it was a very strange feeling," he said. "Walking towards centre court - I'd never done it before - walking through the alleys just behind the scenes before anyone sees you. Before I walked on the court, the man who escorted me asked, 'so, do you know how it works on centre court?' I said that I didn't. Then he looked at Pete and said 'well, you probably know.' I had to laugh.

"He told me that I had to turn around at the service line and make my bow to the (Royal) Box. That is something special, something I probably always wanted to do once in my life and career."

The burning question that remained was how he would react to playing Sampras. He'd been compared to the great man for years, admired him for as long as he could remember, and here he was about to mix it with him on the biggest stage in the world. It was the ultimate test.

"Sometimes I looked across the net and saw him, someone so special and different," said Federer. "Normally you look on the other side and just see an opponent, but this time when I looked over, I saw Pete Sampras, my idol.

"I didn't feel normal. On my first service game my hands were ice cold, but I started off with an ace so that relieved me straightaway.  I was thinking, 'Oh come on, that's a good start!' After the first two games we played, it was a normal match and I got into the groove."

So much so that after three and a half hours, they were still going at it. At 4-4 in the final set, with Federer serving, Sampras went in for the kill.

"I was really scared that my chance was slipping away," said Federer. "I could see on his face that he was raising his game."

But to the champion's amazement, Federer stood firm, held serve, and turned the tables, forcing two match points on the American's serve.

"I was very calm walking to the other side at 15-40," said Federer, re-living the moment. "Of course the crowd were going wild, but I was very focused on what I had to do. I took a chance, told myself that he would go to my forehand, and everything seemed to go so quickly. I hit it and I knew right then, 'that's it.'"

It was the most astonishing moment. As Sampras turned to watch the ball drop well inside his baseline, Federer fell to his knees, then collapsed onto his back as the weight of what he had done began to register.

"I went down on my knees and thought, 'Wow, this is better than anything I have ever experienced so I might as well just lie down!  I had the feeling that I could have laid down there forever."

He didn't. He got up immediately and ran to the net where Sampras was waiting patiently. Federer knew what he had done. He'd inflicted the most painful injury possible on the champion by beating Sampras in a place that the American regarded as his own back yard. To celebrate while Sampras waited at the net would only add salt to the champion's wounds.

"I told myself to go and shake hands with Pete. I couldn't make him wait because he must have felt terrible and wanted to get out of there. I think it was a thing of respect," said Federer.

Packing his bags and heading for the exit, rapturous applause ringing in his ears, he walked obliviously past Sampras as the beaten champion stopped, bowed to the Royal Box, and trundled off again. Federer looked horrified. He turned red, quickly jumped back in line with Sampras, half-bowed, and shuffled off the court, grinning sheepishly. It was as if he'd forgotten to thank his best friend's mother for a lovely dinner, and suddenly rushed back to make his apologies.

"You know what happened?," protested Federer, pleading his innocence. "The guy who brought me on the court told me that the umpire is supposed to tell me what happens after the match, but how in the world could I hear what the umpire said when I shook hands with him? I don't even remember shaking hands with him! Everyone was making a big deal out of it, but I did the bow in the end."

In truth, no one made a big deal out of it. There was something rather endearing about watching this young boy performing miracles on court, and then innocently forgetting the formal bit at the end.

"It was typical me!” he confirmed. "I think everything went so quickly and if I had to think about the bow as well, it would have just been asking too much."

The world hailed a new star. The 'king was dead, long live the king', they said. But this wasn't to be Federer's Wimbledon crown, not yet. Despite a similarly brilliant and equally stubborn performance against Britain's Tim Henman in the quarterfinals, Federer ran out of steam.

At 20 though, life is good. He has endless skill, a genuinely nice nature and a wickedly good sense of humour (his latest practical joke involves the victim calling his mobile phone, hearing Federer answer 'hello?', but then feeling stupid when the voice adds 'ha, got you again, leave a message'). In short, he has the potential to become one of the biggest names in the game.

Fellow New Balls Andy Roddick, Marat Safin and Juan Carlos Ferrrero will make waves of their own in the future, but it's the potential rivalry between Federer and Hewitt which really get pulses racing. They couldn't be more different.  Federer's game and personality are loose, relaxed and easy on the eye while Hewitt is intensity personified.

The match they played in the Basel semifinals in 2000 was enough to make the mouth water. Both players ran side to side, hit the cover off the ball and dripped emotion throughout, and after saving a match point it was Federer who came through.

There was something familiar about watching Federer purr to the net and Hewitt counterattack from the baseline. It was like Sampras against Agassi all over again.

"I like to play Hewitt," says Federer. "I'm not surprised that he won the US Open because his game is so solid, his feet always move and his legs are always there.  For me it's different. I have to tell myself to move. I hope  that in the future my condition will be so good that I never lose matches because of my body again. If I can do that, I think I will be very dangerous, more dangerous even than him. When you play Hewitt, you know what's coming. When you play me, you don't know what's going to come."  

One thing's for sure, if they both turn it on at the same time, tennis fans are in for a treat.

As Eurosport commentator Simon Reed put it, when he watched the Swiss beat the Australian that day in Basel:

"I've just seen the future of tennis, and it looks alright to me."  

What a moment that was for me,
first time on center court at Wimbledon.
Only time vs Pete my hero
I miss the Pistol https://t.co/XJH5j3Bhcf

— Roger Federer (@rogerfederer) July 7, 2020

Cromar wrote:
IT AIN'T OVER YET!  


Roger's statement made during an interview with the German Magazine ZEIT, published on Zeit.de on July 8, 2020.

Unfortunately, the full interview can only be read with a subscription (which I don't have! - maybe someone does?). ...

„You astonish yourself again and again“

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Roger Federer, the best tennis player of all time, about his future – and the loneliness on the court

By Christoph Amend, Zeit Magazin #29, July 9th, 2020

Roger Federer is considered the best tennis player of all time. In his youth years he smashed his raquets, today he is admired for his elegance. In August he turns 39, but he doesn‘t want to stop. Here he talks about his family, the loneliness on the court and the most beautiful moment in his life.

What can Roger Federer tell about the loneliness of the tennis player on the court? „Some matches last 3, 4, 5 hours – and you are always alone“, he says. „You aren‘t allowed to talk with anyone and as soon as someone talks to you, you get a warning: What is going on?“ Even if you just quickly want to ask the family, the coach, if everything is ok, the umpires intervene, the rules are strict.

„Tennis is a very special sport because of that. That‘s why you sometimes talk to yourself.“ He notices how he talks to himself? He laughs, nodds. He could understand that some viewers think: „Are those people on the court cuckoo?“ Can he escape the loneliness with the self-talking? „You sometimes have to talk to yourself in order to divert, to refocus. You are often in a point-by-point mentality. That‘s like with running: One step, another step, that‘s what we say a thousand times during a match.“ Andre Agassi, another legendary tennis player, once said that tennis would be the most lonely sport. „It is like that“, says Roger Federer.

How does such a self-talk work, when Roger Federer talks to Roger Federer, observed by thousand of people in the stadion and millions of television viewers? „That can go from very positive to very negative“, he says and gives an example how he criticises himself: „What are you doing here the whole time?!“ Sometimes you have to be hard on yourself. It is actually a co-commentating.“
He already did this in the past, as a junior player: „Back then I commentated every ball.“

Federer junior commentated that loud that everyone could listen. „My parents nearly freaked out“, he remembers. „When you continue like this“, they told him, „we don‘t come on the tour with you anymore, this is embarrassing.“ For a moment he reacted defiant: „Then just go away! You don‘t have to watch!“ But in the next moment he thought: „That won‘t work neither.“ It‘s a cracking defeat which forces the young player to finally change, cracking also in the truest sense of the word. It happens in 2001, 2 years before his first GS title, the first title in Wimbledon.

„Hamburg, first round against Franco Squilari. After the match point I smashed my raquet and said to me: Now it‘s over, I can‘t continue to behave like this. In front of the crowd in the stadion, at the live broadcasting; my parents, my friends, my coaches, everyone will look at me and think: Aren‘t you full 100, tennis matches aren‘t that important.“ - „Aren‘t you full 100?“ is Swiss German for: „Are you out of your mind?“

That is the moment when he realized that he has to change, but it takes time until he manages. He consults a psychologist. „That was an extreme long process. Only 2 years later I truly knew how to behave on the court in order on the one hand not to be to indifferent and on the other hand not to go up to 180 immediately. I called that myself fire and ice.“ The fire he needed in order to win, to be happy about a great shot, the ice, in order to get over loss of points and the frustration about failed shots.

Who has watched Roger Federer in the past 2 decades at one of his many big victories, alone 8 time in Wimbledon, altogether 20 Grand Slam titles, 310 weeks as #1 in the ranking, can‘t really imagine the young, irascible, loud shouting Roger Federer anymore. In August the relaxed, at peace in himself Roger Federer turns 39.

At a Tuesday afternoon in the beginning of June he is sitting in the office of the Swiss sport shoe producer On in Zürich, wearing a white polo shirt, mid-length black hair, just as you know him from his tennis appearances. Last autumn he announced that he became involved in the company, in July he will bring to market together with On an own tennis sneaker, named after him. We are connected via live video, Corona pandemic, it is still complicated to travel to Switzerland.

„Hello! In which language do we talk“, asks Roger Federer, „in English, German or Swiss-German?“ When I answer that he can decide that, he laughs, ok, then Swiss-German please - „I‘m only joking!“ Does he speak differently in Swiss-German? He nodds. „With High-German I always feel I have to control my tongue better because it doesn‘t come that automatically. I‘m lacking the practice. I seldom speak High-German as everything is always in Swiss-German or English, but this is a good test for me to see how fast High-German comes back.“ He laughs again. In which language does he actually dream? „In English or Swiss-German“, depending on where he would be. „I talk a lot in English as my team is speaking in English together. And my mother comes from South Africa and I talk often in English with her as well. With my kids, my wife and my coach, who is coming from Bern, I talk in Swiss-German of course. And also with my physio, who is from Luzern, who I spend a lot of time with.“

Daniel Troxler is looking after Roger Federer every day, since 6 years, he belongs to the entourage, both know each other for 2 decades. The daily, often intensive treatment lasts 1,5 hours. „Imagine this!“ After all those years the physio knows the body of the player like nobody else. „He can feel how tired I am, how the strain is, also mentally. He notices everything. We don‘t talk that much anymore though as he wants to concentrate and I want to recover. Massages sound wonderful but sometimes I think it would be nice not to have one today.“ He sighs slightly and you feel in that moment that he certainly won‘t miss this daily treatment when he stops with top sport.

Roger Federer was born on August 8th, 1981 in Basel as son of Swiss Robert Federer and South African Lynette Durand. The parents got to meet in 1970 in South Africa, they are living in Switzerland since 1973, the father worked for a pharmaceutical company. As a young boy Roger plays soccer, table tennis, later also squash. „We have never seen Roger as a future Wimbledon winner“, Lynette told in an interview, others would have recognized it earlier, his coaches in the tennis club.

And how did it go for Roger Federer? „When I went to the Swiss intensive training centre when I was 14 years old, I was still young and short“, he relates. Just when he got taller he could suddenly keep pace with professional players. Today he is 1,86 metres, his height made him stronger. „I could have a look at the mens competition, won sets in practice and saw: I‘m not that far away.“

His parents finance his tennis education. „When Roger was between 13 and 17 years old, we paid about 30 000 CHF the year for his career“, says his father. But the parents stay sceptic if the professional sport is the right thing, whereas Roger Federer is certain: When he is 16 years old, he wants to be a professional. „I have asked my parents if it‘s ok that I stop with the school“, he says. „My father told me: You have exactly 2, 3 years. When you won‘t be good you go directly back to school.“ How has Roger Federer reacted to this? When he answers the question he raises his voice, he imitates himself and suddenly you can hear the 16 years old Roger from Basel who wants to go to Wimbledon: „Definitely! I believe I can have the breakthrough! I believe, I have it in myself!“ The answer from his father: „Many people already said this!“ - „That‘s when I replied: But I believe I have something special, that‘s what everyone tells me anyway!“
Roger Federer switches back to his adult voice; „Fortunately I became world #1 at the juniors quickly.“ Roger Federer doesn‘t have to get back to school anymore, in 1998 he has his debut on the ATP Tour, in 2001 he wins his first tournament, in 2003 for the first time in Wimbledon.

Is it really true, what you could read quite often, that he became a tennis player due to Boris Becker? „Also, yes“, he says. „The Becker-boom, Steffi Graf, Anke Huber, Michael Stich, that was the time. RTL [note : It‘s a German TV channel] has shown Wimbledon back then, I remember the World Cup matches in Hannover and Frankfurt“, every match he would have watched on TV. „Shortly thereafter Martina Hingis came in Switzerland, things really got going. Boris Becker was my big idol but I quickly also adored Stefan Edberg, he played so beautiful.“ Years later Roger Federer would hire Stefan Edberg as a coach, he also wanted to have that elegance in his game.

He would have had 3 sport idols when he was a teenager, relates Roger Federer: Boris Becker, Stefan Edberg and Michael Jordan, who is a kind of Roger Federer in basketball. Michael Jordan is also seen as the best player of all time in his sport – what the Wimbledon titles are for Federer, are for Jordan the NBA titles with the Chicago Bulls. The American writer David Foster Wallace once compared the two athletes with each other when he did a reasearch for a portrait of Roger Federer. Who would want to understand the elegance with which Federer dominated the mens tennis, Wallace wrote in 2006, would have to delve into metaphysics. „The metaphysical explanation is that Federer is one of the truly seldom athletes for which certain physical laws don‘t apply. Things with basketball player Michael Jordan are similiar, who can‘t only jump incredible high but can stay in the air longer than the force of gravity actually allows.“ Federer would never appear to be rushed, would never lose the balance, enthused David Foster Wallace. It is Federer‘s principe, fire and ice.

Has Roger Federer seen the documentary „The Last Dance“ about Michael Jordan, which is shown on Netflix since this spring? It tells about Jordans most successful years in the NBA, Netflix has published worldwide 2 new episodes every week. „Not yet“, answers Roger Federer and now sounds like the Michael Jordan fan who he was as a teenager. „I saved it up until now so that I can watch all episodes one after another, as I didn‘t want to wait all the time, you get crazy then. But I already heard that they are great.“ He makes a short break. „Of course I also already thought: Should I have a TV crew with me in order to do a documentary? But with the family this is always a bit difficult. And do I really need even more people in my life who are always around me?“

In 2009 Roger Federer married the former tennis player Mirka Vavrinced, in the same year the twin daughters Charlene and Myla are born, 5 years later the twin sons Leo and Lenny were born. The family leads a withdrawn life in Switzerland, when they aren‘t on tour with Roger Federer and the entourage, coaches, physio, manager.

The relationship between tennis players and their coaches is special. Unlike in soccer of basketball the coaches don‘t sign a contract with a club or association but with the player himself, they are also equally bosses, who give the player instructions on the court and employees, who get their salary from the player. When Roger Federer split in 2007 from his long-term coach Tony Roche, he talks in an interview with the [German] newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung as it was the end of a private relationship. „ It was just extremely quiet amongst us. I think it‘s a pity that when you have as much experience as Tony Roche and as much experience as Roger Federer, you don‘t make something better out of it. You are together but actually you aren‘t together. In the last months it slipped us a bit.“

How does Roger Federer see the relationship player – coach in his sport, is the comparision with a private relationship right? „You can say it like this, yes. Today it is different as my family is my family, my wife and my kids. But when I look back at Peter Lundgren for example, you are sitting together at the table, breakfast, lunch, dinner, every day the same, always together on the hotel room, you play videogames together, travel together and this 43 to 45 weeks a year. That this can get stale all of a sudden is normal.“ Peter Lundgren was Federer‘s coach for 3 years, coached him at his first Wimbledon title in 2003, at the end of that year Federer split from him. After a few change of coaches, Roger Federer started to think about it if everything has to continue like this. And he concluded like he says it, „that I don‘t want this anymore, that‘s why I have 2 coaches since a few years, so there is a variety.“ He adds: „The coaches also have their relationships! I don‘t want it that their relationships end because of me. Fair enough that they nearly want to give me their life, but it can‘t get that far.“

Each tennis era is influenced by its outstanding players and their duels against each other. Björn Borg and John McEnroe in the early 80ies, later McEnroe against Boris Becker, Becker against Andre Agassi. The most special thing of the current era: There are 3 excellent players fighting to become the best of the best.

Roger Federer has especially 2 rivals, first of all Rafael Nadal, then the 5 years younger Novak Djokovic. Federer and Djokovic barely speak in public about their relationship but it‘s not rated as especially good, which one can also recognize as Djokovics father is criticizing Federer for years. This year he claimed that Roger Federer would be „jealous“ about his son. It‘s true that Djokovic, also the current #1 in the world, leads the H2H with Federer with 27 : 23, but Federer has won 3 more Grand Slam titles. Above all he is the public favorite. No matter where they met so far – the crowd was always on the side of Roger Federer.

(A few weeks after this ZEITmagazin interview with Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic has to confess that he got infected with Corona in June at the Adria Tour, which he co-organized. The tennis tournament had to get prematurely cancelled due to the many infections amongst the participants. He also attracted attention due to the distribution of all sorts of conspiracy theories regarding Corona.)

With Rafael Nadal, his other longtime rival, he is meanwhile friends with. „He was very shy in the beginning“, he says about Nadal. „On the court he was aggressive and strong, but off the court extremely shy. Of course a rivalry came up, which is good and which we liked, even though it was sometimes not easy. We had our problems but in the end we always knew who we are, that you lose with decency and how good to represent the sport.“ Both families, the Federers and Nadals, became friends within the years. „The first ones who congratulated Nadal, when he won Wimbledon in 2008, were my parents.“ The final lasted nearly 5 hours, the New York Times later on enthused that it would have been „the best match which has ever been played“. The loser in this final: Roger Federer.

In February this year Federer and Nadal met once more for a big match, in Cape Town, a charity match in front of 52 000 viewers, world record for a tennis match. „My last match! I hope there comes more.“ In the end of February Federer announces that he has to undergo a knee surgery. Back then he was optimistic to be back for the grass season in the summer, he has Wimbledon and the Olympic Games in view. Then comes Corona, the lockdown interrupts also the tennis season.

Roger Federer talks about the match in Cape Town. „Finally to get to play in South Africa again“, he says, in the country of his mother, it was a dream for years, „the last time I played there was as a kid with my family.“ Lynette Federer, his mother, told Swiss Tagesanzeiger shortly after the match in February that she saw a change in her son. „The more often he is in Africa, the more curious Roger gets. We now talk way more about history.“ He has always been interested in South Africa, Roger Federer says, „but I was in a temporal undertow, world #1, Grand Slams, all the victories, then my own family: You don‘t have time for everything.“ When you listen to him you can imagine that he exactly explained it like this to his mother. „But in the last years I deliberately decided to travel to Southern Africa again and again. Then the dream arised: Hey, I really have to play in South Africa again as long as I‘m active. It took some years but then everything was perfect, the weather cooperated, then the world record.“

On one of his trips to Africa, to Malawi, for his foundation, which finances education projects, something happened to Roger Federer which didn‘t happen for a very long time. „When I pass people here in Switzerland and look them into the eyes“, he says, „they know by 99% who I am.“
In Malawi he met a group of children who didn‘t recognize him. He thought how to describe them his job. „I made a drawing of a tennis court, a stadion, cameramen and ballkids.“

Roger Federer once said that playing tennis in front of a crowd is like playing in a theatre, like on a stage. „Yes“, he says, and he meanwhile misses it a lot. „In the beginning not that much as you couldn‘t do much anyway. We were just glad that we weren‘t sick and that all our friends and family were feeling good. But now I miss it, I would like to be in a full stadion again.“ He would like to be there of course as he knows that his farewell is near, he doesn‘t have much time left, he is nearly 39, adding to this the problems with the knee. „I will also miss it when I have stopped playing.“ He pull himself together, in autumn the tour is supposed to continue, as a start without a crowd just like with soccer. „It comes back“, he says. „We have to stay patient now.“

Roger Federer once had the dream to play against Björn Borg, who was seen as the best player of all time before him. Borg could be his father, so it‘s a dream which could never come true. Björn Borg ended his career at an early age, already with 26, to early, as many said back then. Federer goes the other way, he plays as long as it is possible somehow. „I only realized later what Björn Borg meant for the sport“, he says. „He was one of the first who got sponsoring. He was one of the first who stood for pop culture in tennis, I think he was for a while the second most known person in the world, after the Pope.“ Federer points to the sneakers which are lieing on the table in front of him in the office. „I‘m also sitting here because of him, That I can do such investments today, that I have such sponsors, that I‘m on the Forbes list, that would have been unthinkable without Björn Borg.“

The Forbes list. At the end of May the US financial magazine Forbes reported that Roger Federer would be for the first time the top-earning athlete in the world with 106 million $, even ahead of Christiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi, in front of LeBron James and Tiger Woods, another record in his life. He is also the first tennis player who leads this list, another record. That is mostly due to his sponsoring contracts, he promotes more than 12 brands. How did he hear from the Forbes research?
„My manager told me that Forbes called: Apparently you are the #1. That‘s when I thought: Oh god, no, does this have to be?“ Maybe it would be good for tennis, he says, „that we can keep up with soccer, boxing, Formula 1 and basketball, where the salaries are also incredible. But I‘m embarassed actually when this is in the newspaper.“

About one thing he lately realized about his sport and the role, he is playing in it, he says now: „We are also in entertainment. Today I see this much clearer as before: It‘s not only about myself. People are coming from far away, they give time, they give money, to see you play. It is extremely important that they get their money‘s worth.“

How long will the crowd still be able to see the entertainer Roger Federer? How is the right knee? „Everthing ok. I‘m in rehab. I want to return healthy. We will see how long it will work.“ A few days after our chat Roger Federer tweets that it will take longer with the knee, he had to undergo another knee arthroscopy, but he would be looking forward to the tour start in the beginning of the next year.

I read out an old quote from him: „Tennis is my art, my means of expression. Others can paint, dance or sing, I can set a passing shot from an inpossible angle onto the line.“ - „Have I really said it like that?“ He laughs. „Ok. Today not always anymore!“ He laughs again.

When does Roger Federer acutally enjoy tennis the most? On YouTube there are videos with collages of his most spectacular rallies – could it be that he he mostly likes his stops, who are getting over the net very slowly and often don‘t leave his opponent a chance to even reach them? Now he smiles. „It gives me the most satisfaction when a touch for the ball is involved and not brute force. You astonish yourself sometimes. You are practicing very, very hard. Sometimes incredible things happen in the matches.“ What does he mean? Sometimes he thinks that he wanted to play a certain shot exactly like this, then he would be happy, „but there are also many shots, where the people think that was incredible talent but it was actually just pure luck.“ He likes it the most when he surprises himself. „When everything goes especially good, I sometimes think: Wow, such a shot you have never displayed yet.“

Our interview time is at the end, one last question. When he closes the eyes and thinks of the most beautiful moment he has ever experienced on the tennis court, which scene does he see? Roger Federer is leaning back, closing his eyes, thinking, opening the eyes again. „My first Wimbledon title. That was the moment of which I dreamed as a little kid.“ One last time he raises his voice, the adult world star Roger Federer imitates the young Roger: „Yes, I will win Wimbledon!“ He lowers his voice again. „Suddenly it is reality.“ And then he says a sentence which explains why Roger Federer, the best tennis player in the world, will play as long as his body allows him: „That was the most beautiful and important moment in my life.“

Best regards to all and hope that everyone is very well