MELBOURNE—The Fanatics, those motley Aussie crazies decked out in green and gold, were chanting again in Rod Laver Arena on Sunday evening. They had done a bang-up job all through the first week, helping two of their own, Bernard Tomic and Lleyton Hewitt, upset their way into the fourth round. Even as Tomic and his opponent tonight, Roger Federer, warmed up, they were giving it their best. When one of Tomic’s practice serves echoed with a hard crack, the Fanatics broke into a bit of impromptu K.C. and the Sunshine Band: "That’s the way, uh huh, uh huh, I like it, uh huh, uh huh,” complete with the police-siren-style, “oo-oo-oo-whoo-oo-oo-oo-oo” at the end. The full house in Laver giggled. There was an anticipatory buzz in the air. The golden boy was going up against the legend. Big things could happen in Oz tonight.
A little over an hour later, the buzz had gone flat. Anticipation was slowly, surely, giving way to dread. After a competitive first set had, essentially, ended with a Tomic double fault at break point at 4-all, Federer had blown the doors open in the second. The Fanatics, of course, kept chanting. What else, really, can you do, when your face is painted like an Aussie flag and your head is covered with a huge, gold court jester’s hat? But the opportunities to get up and sing, “That’s the way I like it” were getting fewer and farther between. Finally, when Federer broke Tomic in the middle of the set, and then started his own service game with his fourth drop shot winner of the match, the good-natured Fanatics couldn't take it anymore. One of them yelled into a dead silent Laver, “You used to be cool, Roger!”
Yes, Federer, who has employed at least two Aussie coaches in the past, and who says he gets more support here than anywhere outside of Switzerland, was betraying his old mates. He was embarrassing their golden boy. He was ruining a very big evening. And he was doing it with a disheartening variety of shots.
How did Federer win this match, and win it by the ultra-routine score of 6-4, 6-2, 6-2? He did it with a surprise addition, the forehand drop shot. It had been assumed that the savvy Tomic would be the one to throw a new wrinkle at his older opponent, but the old man beat him to the punch—and to the touch. The drop shot worked. Tomic, despite having tracked down dozens of them against Alexandr Dolgopolov in his last match, was left flat-footed by Federer’s.
Federer won it with backhands up the line. He seemed to hold the shot in reserve and bring it out like a dagger, to secure breaks, open up leads in games, and demoralize Tomic in general. The kid never saw it coming. Federer hit with a rolling ease, but Bernie couldn’t catch up.
Federer won by hitting 45 winners and 13 aces, and, perhaps more important, holding Tomic to seven and zero in those two categories, respectively. He did it by making returns (76 percent of them) and forcing Tomic, who wanted to be more aggressive than he’d been in his previous matches, to rally. The Aussie finished with 24 errors to go with those seven winners. Tomic had hoped to fluster his opponent and leave him with nowhere to go, but he ended up on the other side of that equation.
Federer won with a leaping flick backhand overhead winner. He won with a short-hop, no-look backhand down the line that had Tomic looking to his player’s box for help. He won by taking an exaggerated Tomic slice and carving it even thinner. He won by retrieving Tomic’s bomb forehands, and he finished it by hitting a huge crosscourt forehand winner when he was down break point early in the third set. Tomic was making his last stand at that point; Federer made sure it ended there.
Federer won despite starting the match a little of unsure of himself and exactly how to play his opponent.
“In the beginning,” Federer said, “I was still trying to find sort of the right balance between when to slice, when to play aggressive."
There wasn’t much more analysis from the two players. It was too one-sided to linger on, but Federer did claim that it was tougher than it looked. As for Tomic, while he told the press yesterday that he would try to get the ball low to Federer’s backhand, that’s not how he played it. He said afterward that his plan was to be more aggressive, but that after his last two, fairly passive wins, he had trouble making the switch. Tomic also claimed that the same shots that worked for him against other players didn’t work quite so well against Federer. He was better at anticipating them.
Bernie had said before this match that he had learned “a lot” when he played Federer earlier this year in Davis Cup. Asked what he learned tonight, he flashed a quick smile: “Even more.”
Tomic looked tired by the end, and he had a deer-in-the-headlights look for most of the night. It’s been a great week for him, and Federer told him so: “Great tournament again. Work hard,” the champ advised the kid when they shook hands at the net. But while Tomic is clearly the real thing, a doubt lingers: He has a unique style, and you have to let him play the way he wants to play. But he also errs on the side of casualness, and I think that’s going to have to change.
Federer gets Juan Martin del Potro next, and judging by the seriousness of his remarks about that match-up tonight, he knows he's in for an entirely different ballgame. But before we look ahead, let’s take a moment to note that Federer can still put on a performance as varied, intelligent, and complete as any you’re ever going to see. It doesn’t matter who the opponent is, really; on evenings like this, Federer might as well be on his own out there.
The Fanatics knew it, too. By the end, they were reduced to reminding everyone, and presumably the man from Switzerland, that, “This is Australia! This is Australia!” That’s good news for Federer. As he said, and as he showed tonight, he feels right at home here.