Australian Open final: On the Bright Side.
written: 1:19 a.m. on Monday, Feb. 02, 2009

I really ought to go to bed considering I have class at 9, but I mentioned I'd lose sleep over a Roger loss...which is kind of happening now, even though I'm actually really tired. I had four pieces of Toblerone chocolates for dinner when my stomach was yelling at me to fill it up and barely choked them down (I also had difficulties swallowing my food when I was having lunch on Pupillage Day), and skipped meals don't really go down very well with me. I feel them instantly. It makes me light-headed and groggy, plus the fact that the match was so long and so emotionally draining...yeah, I'm really tired.

But this has to be said. Before that, though, a preamble: One good thing that's come out of my FederWorship is that it's chipped away at the negativity that I wear as a protective shield. In simple English, I'm generally and perhaps intrinsically a very negative person, always expecting the worst just in case I get my heart broken. This Australian Open, though, especially this final, I was actually optimistic. I really believed he could do it. And this sudden injection of positivity didn't come from nowhere; it came from Roger. He wanted to face Nadal in the final, just like he wanted to face him in last year's US Open (in retrospect, I'm soooo glad he didn't, so thank you, Andy Murray, for taking Nadal out and then losing to Roger). And when everything seemed bleak, when everyone was writing him off, when he was facing the hardest, most devastating defeat, he bounced back and saw every match from the 0-0 starting point. He saw 2009 as a new beginning despite having the worst year of his career, and even after crying for the first time over a grand slam loss (apparently he didn't even cry during the trophy ceremony at last year's Wimbledon, and Wimbledon belongs to him), he still said in his post-match presser that he believes he can beat Nadal.

His positivity and seemingly endless optimism is absolutely inspiring. Of course, he can't exactly go on record in public saying, "I think my career is over, but I'm not really sure about that so I'll just play a while more and see how it goes." But he's a straight talker. He pretty much called Novak Djokovic a quitter when Djoker retired in his quarter-final match against Andy Roddick, and Roger tells it like it is. If he played well, he'd say he played well, but he lost to the better player; if he played badly, he'd say so, too. If he doesn't want this anymore, if he's sick of playing tennis, he'd just quit. Retiring now would probably serve him better than retiring a few years later. At least he has his 13 Slams, at least his legacy is still more or less intact, at least he doesn't have to lose any more to the likes of Nadal and Murray.

But he's a fighter, and he believes in his talent, and he loves the game, which is why he's still doing this. And you need a huge amount of optimism and positivity in order to fight back from being 0-40 to hold serve, the way he's done so many times last year. And although it absolutely broke my heart to learn that he cried at the ceremony and to see the pictures and eventually the video on YouTube, I know that he'd see this loss as a learning point, and he'd be stronger because of it. He embodies the saying "What doesn't kill you will only make you stronger". Considering he lost in straight sets in the 2008 Australian Open semi-final, and although Roger Federer used to be synonymous with victory, I'd say his run this year is a considerable improvement from last year. And I'm sure he'd see it from this angle, too, and focus on the rest of the year.

Anyway, so much for a preamble. On to what I want to say - a few positive things to take away from this match:

1. His backhand held up impressively under Nadal's relentless attack. Every time Nadal forced Roger into a backhand rally, I'd stop breathing until the point ends. In the matches I watched last year in which pretty much everyone attacked his backhand, it'd go haywire after maybe five shots - he'd hit it long, way long. But today (yesterday), he made amazing cross-court winners with just one hand, and amazing cross-court backhand shots that I didn't think he would've been able to make last year. I'm really happy with the way his backhand rose to the occasion with this match.

2. The mental block is quite clearly there, if only because this was his poorest showing in a grand slam final that I've seen so far (disclaimer: I haven't seen a lot. I haven't watched Wimbledon 2008 and I will never watch it. But I have seen last year's US Open final, duh, and the 2007 Australian Open final, and the 2003 Wimbledon final, and the 2005 Wimbledon final, and the 2007 US Open final) and I attribute it to the Nadal Factor. Like I said, if it had been anyone else, he would've came out all aggressive and relentless. But even with the mental block, he put up a very, very tough fight. He made Nadal work for his service holds and won two easy (relatively, that is), convincing sets against Nadal, 6-3 and 6-3. He had one brilliant service game in which he held at love and fired aces and service winners. It shows, at least, that when he has his nerves under control, when he's confident, he can do anything against Nadal - anything.

3. Roger's humanity continues to shine through, and it only endears him to me more. I like cool, expressionless, lethal killing machine Roger as much as the next person; but I love that he's able to let go and express how he truly feels. I love that underneath that facade of calm lies an emotional man who sometimes can't control his feelings. 2008 was about Roger Federer becoming human after four and a half years of cool, lethal dominance, but even in 2008 he never cried so publicly and immediately after losing a Grand Slam (and er, yeah, he lost two).

Today, though, he showed us that he is, truly, just human after all, and this is why we - his fans - love him so much:



4. Along a similar vein, and much as I hate to say this, I guess one good thing that came out of Roger crying and everything is...Nadal isn't completely evil.



He could have basked in the limelight and not given a shit about the fact that Roger was trying to compose himself to one side after being unable to speak through his tears when he received his plate, but he didn't. So, yeah. He's not completely evil. But I still don't like him, and absolutely hate the way he plays such a beautiful sport.

5. He knew what went wrong, at least technically: his serve. He was massively let down by his serve, and he knew it. He also knew that his serve is vastly superior to Nadal's (though he didn't put it in so many words; he said that his serves try to find corners and paint the lines, while Nadal only strives to get them in. Very true. Nadal's serve doesn't have much variation). At least he knows that much.

6. He won two sets comfortably against Nadal. Not taking anything away from Nadal's victory, but let's face it: Roger eventually gave it away. The match was his to lose from the start, and he gave Nadal the victory on a silver platter in the fifth. I have no idea why; I couldn't sit through the whole thing as I was too nerve-wrecked. I would have thought he would have bounced back from 6-3 in the fourth to clinch the victory, but maybe he was too mentally tired to claw his way back into the match after he was broken at 1-4. At least, at the very least, the physical game is there. It's always been there. It's just the mental part that worries me, but at least it wasn't a case of him being outplayed.

Justin called me just now after I sent this really depressed-sounding SMS reply to him and he said that Nadal hits shots that are out of this world. It's got a lot to do with the way he takes his forehands, and that over-the-head follow-through. It's definitely unorthodox and no one hits the way he does. In all the matches of his that I've seen, I'd watched in shock and horror when a forehand he hits from the far corner of his court appears to be a few centimetres outside of the singles sideline, just to literally curve back in at the last minute and land within the singles sideline. That's the kind of freakish shots Nadal hits - and Roger matched him. Roger even outplayed him until the start of the fifth set. Nadal won comfortably in the fifth because the fight had gone out of Roger after he was down a break. It was unfortunate, but that was what happened. Roger could have given the fight right back...but he didn't. Or he couldn't, I don't know.

But my point is, Roger almost did it. He won one more point than Nadal (i.e. total number of points won. 173 to Roger and 172 to Nadal). Not sure how he lost like this, but oh well. He won one more point than Nadal all the same.

7. This is the first Slam of the year. There are three more, and even if he doesn't win the French, I hope he equals the Sampras Record in Wimbledon, then breaks it in New York. I'd be OVER THE FREAKING MOON if he breaks the record in New York. The US Open is my favourite tournament for the simple reason that it was the first tournament I followed, and the first Grand Slam I saw him win in real time. The US Open will always have a special place in my heart, and even though 2008 sucked for him, 2008, and the US Open, will always be the first time I saw Roger Federer win a Grand Slam.

**

Okay, I think I can sleep now. Fucking tired. Dunno how I'm going to stay awake in class tomorrow.

before sunrise // before sunset


Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010