Gastón Gaudio, the tennis player who wrote one of the most glorious pages of tennis by winning Roland Garros 2004, years ago told during an interview what he thought when he saw Roger Federer play for the first time, who announced his retirement at the age of 41 .
“There was expectation for Federer, they said he was going to be good,” Gaudio began in his story, and continued: “The first time I saw him I said ‘this guy is terrible, he’s never going to be number one in the world. He can’t hit backhand!'”
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In any case, he acknowledged that he was wrong in his forecast: “I didn’t see it as good, imagine what I missed him for. It ended up being the best ever.”
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Recalling the matches they played between them (the record ended 5-0 in favor of the Helvetian), he said: “He won all my games, but always, except in Shanghai, I felt that I could beat him”.
And he recalled: “In Toronto, on cement, I was up 4-1 in the third set and he was serving 15-40. He made me ace, ace, ace, ace and it was 4-2. Then I served, he broke me and I lost 7-5″.
“I don’t know how, but when I had to win the point I always did it,” the Temperley-born anecdote ended.
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One of the most remembered episodes between both players occurred in the semifinal of the Masters at the end of the year in 2005, in which Federer won 6-0 and 6-0 in just 50 minutes of the match.
Years later, Gaudio revealed that the reason for his weak performance that day was because he had a telephone argument with Marcela Kloosterboer, his partner at the time: “I had to play at 11 in the morning, it was 3 and I was still with him phone,” said the former tennis player.
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