Federer, Nadal & the Greatest Match Ever—An Oral History, Part 8 of 12

Few tennis matches have seemed as fated to be classics as the one that was played on Wimbledon’s Centre Court on July 6, 2008. The skies over southwest London were ominous that afternoon, but anticipation had rarely run higher. Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer were about to face off in another final at the All England Club.

TRAILER: Strokes of Genius, sponsored by Humana

David Law, BBC Radio Commentator and host of "The Tennis Podcast": Two shots stayed with me: the forehand down the line that Nadal hit to set up match point in the fourth-set tiebreak; and the backhand down the line that Federer hit to save it, off a violently ripped Nadal crosscourt forehand. I remember a colleague of mine, after those shots, crying, “You could not make this up!”

For the first four sets, I sat courtside, feeding stats into the broadcast. At the end of the fourth, I left my position. I arrived in our production room and the editor said, “Why have you left? We might want to bring you in again for some stats.” I said, “Stats feel irrelevant now. Just let people hear what’s happening. That’s enough.”

With Nadal so close to winning, I thought of an encounter I’d had with him a few weeks earlier. I was running the media department at Queen’s Club, and Rafa came there the day after winning the French Open. As he walked in, rain started to fall, but he walked out to the practice court, passing other players coming in the opposite direction. “Could you put the net back up please?” Nadal asked the groundsman. “Rafa, it’s raining, you can’t practice in this,” the groundsman replied.

But he relented, and Rafa hit for about half an hour.

A few years later, Rafa came back to Queen’s, and the first thing he did was walk to center court and rub his palm over the surface. Maybe it was his way of switching from clay to grass—he needed to feel the court. As great as he is on clay, Wimbledon was the title he most wanted to win.

A LANDMARK DOCUMENTARY DURING THE MOST PRESTIGIOUS EVENT IN SPORTS, CELEBRATING THE UNPARALLELED FEDERER-NADAL RIVALRY AND 10TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE GREATEST MATCH EVER PLAYED.

In association with All England Lawn & Tennis Club, Rock Paper Scissors Entertainment and Amblin Television.  Directed by Andrew Douglas.