I can only recollect it in my imagination now, but there it remains a favorite sign of spring to me. In the old main stadium at the Italian Open, the black-haired girls who worked as ushers—by American standards, I use that word extremely loosely—liked to dance together to the music that was played on the loudspeaker during changeovers. As fans streamed in and out around them, well after the chair umpire had called time, the girls faced each other, clapping their hands and lifting their white sneakers up and down to whatever awful Euro-pop was pumping through the arena.
For the sake of the fans in Rome, I hope they’re doing it again next week when the Italian christens a new stadium. For my own sake many many miles away, I’m hoping that another spring tradition at the Foro Italico continues: The epic men’s final. We were given two of them in the middle of the decade, between Rafael Nadal and Guillermo Coria in 2005, and Nadal and Roger Federer in 2006. Nadal won them both in fifth-set tiebreakers. “Epic” is a lot to ask of a two-of-three-set match, but I’d settle for another final as entertaining as last year’s, between Nadal and Novak Djokovic.
Today I’ll memorialize the narrow old main stadium, with its too-small court, too steep bleachers, lack of luxury boxes, sub-par lighting system, awful Euro-pop, fabulous dancing ushers, and propensity for staging great tennis matches. Click above for highlights from the last two sets of the best of them, the 2006 final between Nadal and Federer. Isn’t it time this tradition was started up again?
—This is the match where clay-court Masters tennis went mainstream. Borg-McEnroe, Sampras-Agassi, those rivalries were played out on hard courts and grass. Now the world was tuned to Rome like it never had been before. Since then, the clay season, even in the U.S., has become the heart of the tennis year, when tensions run highest.
—I like this Federer look, all-white. Do you miss Nadal’s sleevelessness? I can’t say I do, though it did go with his game.
—Four years can seem like an eternity, can’t it? It’s obvious that Nadal has gotten better since this match. His service motion was different then; reliable, but the way he brought the racquet up directly behind his head must have limited the racquet-head speed he could get. His backhand seems more rudimentary here as well, and, while it may be due to the fact that he’s playing an attacking opponent like Federer, he’s not as creative from the baseline. He was more of a classic dirtballer back then.
—In those days, the biggest question in tennis, the one asked ad nauseum every spring, was what Federer could do differently to beat Nadal. The consensus was that he wasn’t coming in enough, he wasn’t taking it to Nadal when he got a mid-court ball. Judging from this clip, even judging from the first point alone, I don’t see what else he could have done. Federer was all over the court, he was drilling forehands into Nadal’s forehand and winning points with that risky tactic. He was dictating much of the play and didn’t seem to hesitate to come forward. But he was playing a guy who could extricate himself from a perilous position better than just about anyone in history.
—In those days, Nadal’s game was thought to be pretty one-dimensional—grunt, belt heavy topspin, fist-pump. We were just beginning to realize that the label didn’t fit. Here he shows how good is at the cat and mouse game at net. Even when he loses those games, he makes the right play. On one point here, Federer brings Nadal forward with a tremendous drop shot. Rather than go for the winner crosscourt, which would have left the court open on his side, he does what you’re taught to do, he keeps the ball in front of him up the line. It’s just that Federer is there with the crosscourt pass. One reason Nadal must be able to live with his defeats is that they rarely come because he’s beaten himself.
—I don’t remember seeing Federer hit so many blatant down the line winners with his forehand. He must have been wondering: How many perfect shots do I need to hit to win a match? That’s the curse and the beauty of the five-set format. This was the match that convinced the ATP to reduce the Masters finals to best of three, because both Federer and Nadal pulled out of the next one, which started the following day in Hamburg. It was a good change in the long run, I think, but I do miss the possibility of seeing matches like this.
—There’s a chess-match quality to these rallies: Who can avoid giving the other guy a look at a forehand? Each is forced either to squeeze the ball into the small window that his opponent has left open for a backhand, or, if they are going to risk it and go to the forehand, they have to make it perfect. The points seem to scrunch up, scrunch up, scrunch up, until one of them flings it wide open and they’re both suddenly flying all over the court.
—Love the dueling fist-pumps. Each of them gives a stern look across the net as they do it. To me, the 2008 Wimbledon final still reigns supreme, for operatic drama and shot-making brilliance, but there’s more of an no holds barred, in your face display here from both guys that’s very cool.
—We miss Federer’s two match points here. But I think we do get an early glimpse of Nadal’s girlfriend in the stands, under a mass of black hair.
—At this stage of their rivalry, when Nadal was chasing him and before he had beaten him in the ’06 Wimbledon final, there was an extra tension in Federer’s demeanor that didn’t exist against other players. At this point, he must have been wondering if the kid was going to take everything over. But he made his stand at Wimbledon.
—Nadal had come back from 0-3 down in the fifth set against Coria the year before. Here he comes back from 2-4 down in the fifth set, and 2-4 down in the fifth-set tiebreaker. Did either of these guys show a single sign of weariness over four hours? Look at the final point of the match: They play it with total abandon, covering every inch of the court.
—Then, when it’s over, after all that time and all that running, Federer, who had lost despite holding two match points, walks over to the chair umpire and shakes his hand politely, without any outward anger of angst. A nice moment I’d never noticed before.
We keep wanting more from this rivalry, but every so often we should look back and remind ourselves how much we've already been given.
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Have a good weekend. I’ll be back to preview this year’s Rome draw on Monday. Stick with me, I’m on a winning streak.