Roger Federer is one of the last tennis grandmasters to have wielded his first wooden racket. The Swiss, a member of a generation very distant from the current one, grew up with idols like Bjorn Borg or Stefan Edberg and now rubs shoulders with boys who have him as a reference.
When Federer was just a Swiss fledgling, his appearances as a ball boy at the 1993, 1994 and 1995 Basel tournaments brought him closer to the stars he dreamed of emulating. It was there when he discovered that tennis had to be his life, that as much as it cost him, it would have to be him who one day, as the winner of the tournament, would congratulate the little children of Basel.
Ranking Along
of his career
2022 announces his retirement due to injuries
Started
in the circuit
professional
in 1998
Ranking throughout his career
2022 announces his retirement due to injuries
Started
in the circuit
professional
in 1998
Ranking throughout his career
2022 announces his retirement due to injuries
Started
in the circuit
professional
in 1998
Therefore, an already adolescent Federer did not let anyone get in the way of his desire. Not even his trusted dentist. In a conservative Switzerland, devoting oneself completely to a sport, without a cushion of studies behind, was little more than madness. Federer’s dentist asked him what he did for a living: “I’m a tennis player,” the Swiss replied. »But, and nothing else?« replied the doctor. Little Federer never went back to that dentist.
That gesture clearly speaks of the ambition of a tennis player who managed to win 20 Grand Slams, breaking Pete Sampras’ unimaginable record of 14 Grand Slams along the way, won 103 titles, spent a total of 310 weeks at the top, with 237 of them consecutively, he won an Olympic gold medal and a silver medal and was an ATP master six times, more than anyone in history. His successors at the top, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic, two other monsters of the racket, have been slowly eroding their records and surpassing them, but the legend of Federer is immune to numbers.
The Swiss will not be the best, or at least this is supported by the statistics of the most Grand Slams won, the one that has traditionally been used to separate some geniuses from others, but Federer plays in the league of greatness, where his elegance, talent pure and class shine more than in any rival.
Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic have been slowly eroding their records and surpassing them, but the Federer legend is immune to numbers
Federer has been loved wherever he has gone. He has been able to get entire tennis courts to agree to support him, out of simple charisma, without the need to raise his arms asking for help, or make a big fuss. Federer has played at home even when someone else’s house was, like with Andy Murray in London. For the memory, the Wimbledon stands will remain, the most respectful in the world, bordering on the boos of Novak Djokovic in the 2019 final, the one that the Basel man escaped with two match points, the one that could be the great climax to his career and that he left for two poorly played points.
Empathy
Federer’s big defeats have also helped empathy with the general public. Federer won a lot, yes, but he also lost a lot. He has conceded in eleven Grand Slam finals. Nobody lost more and only Djokovic, who has one more Grand, and Ivan Lendl, also fell eleven times.
Federer lost, with match point in favor, in a Wimbledon final, in two semifinals in New York, in a Wimbledon quarterfinal, and in two Masters 1,000 finals. In his career total, he lost 54 finals. Nadal and Djokovic, 38 each. Seeing such a human Federer, capable of the best and the worst, has brought him closer to the millions of people who have tried to emulate his tennis on the court.
Players with the most wins
Players with the most wins
Players with the most wins
This weekend will be the last in which Federer’s impossible shots, those that go beyond fiction and seem effortlessly spat out of the racket, will be put to the test on an official court. He will do it with Rafael Nadal at his side, his great rival since that first confrontation in Miami 2004 and who would be his black beast and nemesis.
It will be a doubles match that will bring down the curtain on the career of the one that surely, by numbers, is not the best, but the one that has everything to become the greatest. Because Federer, the man for whom tennis was invented, there will only be one in history.
