Sport's Defining Moments 6: Federer vs Nadal
If I've gained your trust at all as an amateur sports historian, and if you trust your own eyes and your own instincts, you're likely to agree with me that the last, say, 10 years of Men's Tennis is the greatest era in any sport we've ever seen. We're truly lucky to have witnessed it.
This is not to put down any other sport or previous tennis generations - the men's game and the women's game have both known great eras - arguably the women's game from 1995-2005, with the Williamses, Hingis, Graf, Capriati, Davenport, Henin, Clijsters, Seles, Mauresmo etc, had a far higher level of accomplishment, prestige, excitement and competition than the men's for the equivalent period.
But that all changed. It changed with the coming of Federer. Men's tennis was really in a bit of a rut around the turn of the century - Sampras and Agassi were coming to an end, and though Sampras had been magnificent at Wimbledon, a lot of people hadn't warmed to him and his dominance had taken the gloss off a little bit. There were deemed to be too many big servers and not enough rallies. Relative non-entities like Marcelo Rios, Thomas Muster and Magnus Norman had risen to the Number 1 (or 2) spot. The first sign of what was to come was Wimbledon 2001, where young, pony-tailed Federer knocked out defending champion Sampras before being himself halted by Tim Henman - extraordinary that Tim was Federer's bogeyman early on his career. That was the year Henman really really should have won Wimbledon but it went instead to Ivanisevic.
He was the last "random" Wimbledon winner, indeed one of the last "random" Grand Slam winners. By random, I don't mean completely out of nowhere, I mean either that the winner wasn't a clear favourite or that there really wasn't much of a clear favourite. Apart from Serena, women's tennis these days has a lot of fairly "random" winners - there are few stand-out players so the field is very open. This can be great, we don't necessarily want things to be predictable, but what has made this era of men's tennis so remarkable is the consistent high level maintained by a group of top players, which has left little room for "randoms" but never diluted the competition.
Federer still had a a bit of a way to go before he took over - post Sampras, the new Number 1 was Lleyton Hewitt. Lleyton Hewitt? Incredible to think that he was once the future of tennis and that just shows how far the game has come. Hewitt has played the same, limited way all his career, it's just that, to start with, it was good enough to beat everyone else.
So, let's talk about the Big Four. We all know the Big Four - Federer, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray. Although the first two are a fair bit above the third, and third is a fair bit above the fourth, the extent to which these four have consistently reached the heights of the game over the last six or seven years makes the notion of a Big Four justified. There is one other protagonist who is sometimes forgotten about, though, and who I think deserves his part in the story - another Andy - Roddick.
When the Federer era began, it actually seemed for a considerable time like there were going to be a Big Two, Federer and Roddick, sharing the spoils. Roddick won the US Open, got to World Number 1 and was consistently up there. He also got to three Wimbledon finals and was very unlucky not to win at least one of them. In 2004, he won the first set and the next two were very close, but it was 2009 that his effort was most noteworthy, beating Andy Murray in the semi-final, and then losing 16-14 to Federer in the 5th set. God damn, 16-14. That was the third and last in a series of the most exciting finals Wimbledon had ever seen.
When it all comes to an end, notwithstanding any talk of a "Big Four", the indefatigable power of Djokovic and the vast joy that Andy Murray has brought us Brits, this greatest of eras will be defined by Federer and Nadal, how Federer came along and was "the greatest player ever" and then Nadal came along and gradually got the better of the greatest player ever.
In some ways, so spoilt have we been for magnificent tennis matches through this period, it's quite hard to think of a defining moment. I've lost count of the times I've thought "jeez, this is one of the best tennis matches I've ever seen", whether it's Djokovic-Nadal in France, Murray-Djokovic in the US, Del Potro-Djokovic in a Wimbledon semi (Delpo is the other one who deserves to be seen as almost on a level. Without the injuries he's had, it could easily be a Big 5) and in fact, so many matches not involving the very top guys. One of the very best things about this golden era is how fantastic the second and third tier players are - you can watch the likes of Stan Wawrinka, David Ferrer, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Tomas Berdych, Robin Soderling, even lower down the likes of Verdasco, Gael Monfils, Richard Gasquet, Marin Cilic, and you are kidding yourself if you don't think the power and accuracy they play with would best many, many of the finest players from previous eras.
But, saying all that, there is a nub to this story. There are two matches which somehow say it all - the 2007 and 2008 Wimbledon finals, both between Federer and Nadal, the first won by the old master, the second - the one widely spoken of as one of the greatest matches, if not the greatest, of all time - won by the younger master.
Now, I confess, I'd probably write an awful lot more about that one but ... I didn't watch it. Well, I watched the first set or so but then I had to get a train to Manchester, which was then severely delayed, so I followed it mainly on text on my pre-smartphone. Bugger. Nadal won 9-7 in the 5th. It was unforgettable. If you'd watched it. I only have the numbers.
I have a further confession - I couldn't even quite remember if I'd watched the 2007 final. It was on the last morning of a two-week stay in New York and I had to investigate my itinerary to trigger the memory of watching it. Once triggered, it came flooding back, but what good will I be as fount of all sporting knowledge if I can't even remember if I remember epochal sporting moments? ...
Federer had beaten Nadal, then seen primarily as clay court specialist, pretty comfortably in the 2006 Wimbledon final, but the one set Nadal took hinted that he'd be able to compete in future. The 2007 final really was close - I have a feeling the standard of the play varied, but it was dramatic throughout. Federer took the 1st, 3rd and 5th, Nadal the 2nd and 4th. Nadal had his chance in the final set but, to me, Federer's triumph still seemed inevitable. He was the guy for grass, Nadal for clay. That's the way of it. That's why the 2008 victory for Nadal truly represents the point where Nadal challenged Federer's pre-eminence. I doubt I was the only one that doubted it could truly happen, that Nadal could best Federer in his own territory.
Arguably, that dynamic has been set ever since. Nadal nearly always beats Federer. Federer has still won five more Grand Slams since, so it's not like he was irrevocably broken, but I think few have considered Federer as the best in the world since then.
Of course, all of this is about far more than mere statistics, that is why it has enthralled the world, why tennis players regularly win Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, why everyone you know, even people with no interest in sport in general, loves to watch it and has an opinion on it.
Federer has simply been the most aesthetically pleasing sportsman it's possible to imagine, an astonishing combination of grace, speed and power. Nadal's brutal power game was somewhat in contrast to that, but if anyone was setting him up to be the villain of the piece, they soon changed their mind, when they saw how utterly endearing he was. People don't love Federer or Nadal, they love the both of them.
So the search for a bad guy went on; it briefly took in Djokovic (too whiny and temperamental), Murray (too grumpy) Del Potro (a bit robotic), until gradually they all won people over. Be it PR spin or whatever, this era of men's tennis seems to be nearly entirely populated by thoroughly charming, fair-minded and exemplary professionals.
There's something so Corinthian about it. No one complains about how much these guys earn, we just sit back and admire.
Maybe some dark story will all bring it crashing down, who knows. Maybe, as is often the case, there'll be a dull, barren period after they all pass their peak. Truly, there's not that much sign of this Big Four being replaced, though Stan Wawrinka's Australian Open suggested that on his day he's as good as anyone and Federer is very clearly past his best and unlikely to have another Grand Slam in him.
For now, probably, the big issue will be whether Nadal catches and overtakes Federer's record of 17 Grand Slam titles - he currently has 14. Such was the extraordinary grace Federer brought to the game and the influence he's had on his peers, and the way he's taken tennis to the forefront of the sporting world, I think a lot of people would still cling to the idea of Federer has the greatest, even if Nadal does overtake him.
Either way, I would love it, somewhere in a significant match in a Grand Slam, there was one more major Federer-Nadal clash, one more battle of left v right, grace v power, great v great.
This is not to put down any other sport or previous tennis generations - the men's game and the women's game have both known great eras - arguably the women's game from 1995-2005, with the Williamses, Hingis, Graf, Capriati, Davenport, Henin, Clijsters, Seles, Mauresmo etc, had a far higher level of accomplishment, prestige, excitement and competition than the men's for the equivalent period.
But that all changed. It changed with the coming of Federer. Men's tennis was really in a bit of a rut around the turn of the century - Sampras and Agassi were coming to an end, and though Sampras had been magnificent at Wimbledon, a lot of people hadn't warmed to him and his dominance had taken the gloss off a little bit. There were deemed to be too many big servers and not enough rallies. Relative non-entities like Marcelo Rios, Thomas Muster and Magnus Norman had risen to the Number 1 (or 2) spot. The first sign of what was to come was Wimbledon 2001, where young, pony-tailed Federer knocked out defending champion Sampras before being himself halted by Tim Henman - extraordinary that Tim was Federer's bogeyman early on his career. That was the year Henman really really should have won Wimbledon but it went instead to Ivanisevic.
He was the last "random" Wimbledon winner, indeed one of the last "random" Grand Slam winners. By random, I don't mean completely out of nowhere, I mean either that the winner wasn't a clear favourite or that there really wasn't much of a clear favourite. Apart from Serena, women's tennis these days has a lot of fairly "random" winners - there are few stand-out players so the field is very open. This can be great, we don't necessarily want things to be predictable, but what has made this era of men's tennis so remarkable is the consistent high level maintained by a group of top players, which has left little room for "randoms" but never diluted the competition.
Federer still had a a bit of a way to go before he took over - post Sampras, the new Number 1 was Lleyton Hewitt. Lleyton Hewitt? Incredible to think that he was once the future of tennis and that just shows how far the game has come. Hewitt has played the same, limited way all his career, it's just that, to start with, it was good enough to beat everyone else.
So, let's talk about the Big Four. We all know the Big Four - Federer, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray. Although the first two are a fair bit above the third, and third is a fair bit above the fourth, the extent to which these four have consistently reached the heights of the game over the last six or seven years makes the notion of a Big Four justified. There is one other protagonist who is sometimes forgotten about, though, and who I think deserves his part in the story - another Andy - Roddick.
When the Federer era began, it actually seemed for a considerable time like there were going to be a Big Two, Federer and Roddick, sharing the spoils. Roddick won the US Open, got to World Number 1 and was consistently up there. He also got to three Wimbledon finals and was very unlucky not to win at least one of them. In 2004, he won the first set and the next two were very close, but it was 2009 that his effort was most noteworthy, beating Andy Murray in the semi-final, and then losing 16-14 to Federer in the 5th set. God damn, 16-14. That was the third and last in a series of the most exciting finals Wimbledon had ever seen.
When it all comes to an end, notwithstanding any talk of a "Big Four", the indefatigable power of Djokovic and the vast joy that Andy Murray has brought us Brits, this greatest of eras will be defined by Federer and Nadal, how Federer came along and was "the greatest player ever" and then Nadal came along and gradually got the better of the greatest player ever.
In some ways, so spoilt have we been for magnificent tennis matches through this period, it's quite hard to think of a defining moment. I've lost count of the times I've thought "jeez, this is one of the best tennis matches I've ever seen", whether it's Djokovic-Nadal in France, Murray-Djokovic in the US, Del Potro-Djokovic in a Wimbledon semi (Delpo is the other one who deserves to be seen as almost on a level. Without the injuries he's had, it could easily be a Big 5) and in fact, so many matches not involving the very top guys. One of the very best things about this golden era is how fantastic the second and third tier players are - you can watch the likes of Stan Wawrinka, David Ferrer, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Tomas Berdych, Robin Soderling, even lower down the likes of Verdasco, Gael Monfils, Richard Gasquet, Marin Cilic, and you are kidding yourself if you don't think the power and accuracy they play with would best many, many of the finest players from previous eras.
But, saying all that, there is a nub to this story. There are two matches which somehow say it all - the 2007 and 2008 Wimbledon finals, both between Federer and Nadal, the first won by the old master, the second - the one widely spoken of as one of the greatest matches, if not the greatest, of all time - won by the younger master.
Now, I confess, I'd probably write an awful lot more about that one but ... I didn't watch it. Well, I watched the first set or so but then I had to get a train to Manchester, which was then severely delayed, so I followed it mainly on text on my pre-smartphone. Bugger. Nadal won 9-7 in the 5th. It was unforgettable. If you'd watched it. I only have the numbers.
I have a further confession - I couldn't even quite remember if I'd watched the 2007 final. It was on the last morning of a two-week stay in New York and I had to investigate my itinerary to trigger the memory of watching it. Once triggered, it came flooding back, but what good will I be as fount of all sporting knowledge if I can't even remember if I remember epochal sporting moments? ...
Federer had beaten Nadal, then seen primarily as clay court specialist, pretty comfortably in the 2006 Wimbledon final, but the one set Nadal took hinted that he'd be able to compete in future. The 2007 final really was close - I have a feeling the standard of the play varied, but it was dramatic throughout. Federer took the 1st, 3rd and 5th, Nadal the 2nd and 4th. Nadal had his chance in the final set but, to me, Federer's triumph still seemed inevitable. He was the guy for grass, Nadal for clay. That's the way of it. That's why the 2008 victory for Nadal truly represents the point where Nadal challenged Federer's pre-eminence. I doubt I was the only one that doubted it could truly happen, that Nadal could best Federer in his own territory.
Arguably, that dynamic has been set ever since. Nadal nearly always beats Federer. Federer has still won five more Grand Slams since, so it's not like he was irrevocably broken, but I think few have considered Federer as the best in the world since then.
Of course, all of this is about far more than mere statistics, that is why it has enthralled the world, why tennis players regularly win Laureus World Sportsman of the Year, why everyone you know, even people with no interest in sport in general, loves to watch it and has an opinion on it.
Federer has simply been the most aesthetically pleasing sportsman it's possible to imagine, an astonishing combination of grace, speed and power. Nadal's brutal power game was somewhat in contrast to that, but if anyone was setting him up to be the villain of the piece, they soon changed their mind, when they saw how utterly endearing he was. People don't love Federer or Nadal, they love the both of them.
So the search for a bad guy went on; it briefly took in Djokovic (too whiny and temperamental), Murray (too grumpy) Del Potro (a bit robotic), until gradually they all won people over. Be it PR spin or whatever, this era of men's tennis seems to be nearly entirely populated by thoroughly charming, fair-minded and exemplary professionals.
There's something so Corinthian about it. No one complains about how much these guys earn, we just sit back and admire.
Maybe some dark story will all bring it crashing down, who knows. Maybe, as is often the case, there'll be a dull, barren period after they all pass their peak. Truly, there's not that much sign of this Big Four being replaced, though Stan Wawrinka's Australian Open suggested that on his day he's as good as anyone and Federer is very clearly past his best and unlikely to have another Grand Slam in him.
For now, probably, the big issue will be whether Nadal catches and overtakes Federer's record of 17 Grand Slam titles - he currently has 14. Such was the extraordinary grace Federer brought to the game and the influence he's had on his peers, and the way he's taken tennis to the forefront of the sporting world, I think a lot of people would still cling to the idea of Federer has the greatest, even if Nadal does overtake him.
Either way, I would love it, somewhere in a significant match in a Grand Slam, there was one more major Federer-Nadal clash, one more battle of left v right, grace v power, great v great.
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