If you watched the Roger Federer/David Nalbandian semifinal this afternoon, you probably share the feeling that it promised so much and delivered so little; at the start, Stade Roland Garros was like the desert in the midst of a sirocco – dust blowing and swirling everywhere, everyone behind closed doors at home. The green seats were so empty that entire blocks of the stadium looked like pasture-land.
This was not a great atmosphere for a Grand Slam final, and Roger Federer responded in kind, playing like he wasn't a Grand Slam contender. Crazy as it may sound, this seemed to have something to do with The Mighty Fed’s slow start. He hates playing under windy conditions in the same way that a concert violinist may not be eager to play the ukulele in a campus bar on Saturday night.
Then, just when things appeared to be getting interesting, Justi – David Nalbandian came down with an abdominal strain. It’s a pity that the match ended with a woozy Nalbandian defaulting to a rejuvenated and hard-charging Federer. These things happen, of course. How come they happen so often these days?
But those anti-climactic bookends framed something wonderful; one of the best half-plus sets I’ve had the pleasure to watch in a long, long time. Was it merely coincidental that Federer came to life in direct proportion to the size of the crowd drifting in, and the wind laying down as if it were an evening in tropics?
Whatever the reason, the formerly flummoxed Federer, already down a break early in the second, burst into flames – blue, orange, yellow, purple, green, full color spectrum flames.
I was struck by the physical difference between the two players as we eased into game 4 of the second set. Federer has tennis player shoulders – a la Bjorn Borg and Pete Sampras – that is, broad shoulders that resemble a cape as they wrap around his chest – kind of like Count Dracula, or a vulture on its perch.
Everything else about Federer – the narrow waist, the surprisingly thin legs, all emphasize those shoulders and the way they are ideally designed for serving a tennis ball. Is it genetic, or the self-fulfilling prophecy uttered by the 56 billion tennis balls he already hit, before the age of 10?
Nalbandian, by contrast, is a squat fellow who appears to be made entirely of muscle. His legs look too short and his thick torso too long, but don’t be fooled; the low center of gravity gives him enormous torque (think Michael Chang, or Svetlana Kuznetsova), great balance, deep reserves of stamina, and, perhaps, a minor advantage when it comes to the quick start required to run down a drop shot, or change directions. If Federer is a falcon, Nalby is bull – albeit without the clumsiness the image also may evoke.
One of the things that struck me in the following six, glorious games was the amazing variety of – surprise – Nalbandian. This was especially true off the backhand wing, where Nalby simply seems to throw the style manual out the window.
He winds up and – crack! – nails a crosscourt as if the ball is on a tee and his racquet is a three-wood. The next moment, he winds up and – whack! – takes something like a hockey-style slapshot at the ball, and the next, he takes a high serve to his backhand side and – Shhhh. . . – takes the ball as if he were using a lacrosse stick, kind of sliding a soft return back down the line.
He’s quite extraordinary, Nalbandian. I can't think of anyone whose backhand is so pliant. Unfortunately, his reaction to big occasions and the pressure of competition has traditionally been no more predictable than that backhand.
As you all saw, the Falcon came to life, suddenly and unexpectedly, just when his fans - and anyone who wanted to see a great match - was sinking into the slough of despond. The turnaround in TMF’s game – in reality, I think it was the seachange in his attitude and appetite for combat - was so dramatic in the fifth game that it even appeared to rattle the Bull, which explains why Nalbandian gave back that crucial break so meekly, with a double fault.
This is when it started to get really good and The Shot (if you didn’t see it, don’t worry, you’ll see it 5,678,564 times in upcoming weeks) was fired by Federer. It was a sick, stoopid-good shot that he hit, backtracking to the baseline to return what appeared to be a winner with a desperate squash-type shot right off his shoe tops - with his back to the net. It was, to boot, a gorgeous placement as well, beating the Bull down along his forehand line.
In the presser, one of the reporters misidentified the stroke as a between-the-legs shot, which caused Federer to leap in and clarify:
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Didn't go through the legs, you know. Faked it (laughter). No, it's thanks to some, it's all paying off, my squash over the years with my father early on and, you know...
I don't know. It came out automatically. But maybe through squash, who knows. I enjoy the sport. Yeah, helped me out in the semifinals of the French Open, that's not bad (smiling).
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At any rate, that shot rattled Nalbandian. He made an error on the next point to go down love-30, won the next point, then found himself behind, 15-40. TMF converted the second break point, and served it out to level the match. The tennis for a good portion of that time was amazing: Both the Falcon and Bull took big cuts, went for lines, played defense that suddenly became offense in the blink of an eye.
Now here comes the odd part. A lot of this apparently happened while Nalbandian was injuried, which is something I still can't figure out. It's been a long week, perhaps I was hallucinating? For there shortly followed the injury pas de deux (trois, when the doctor got involved, along with the trainer), and soon it was clear that the fireworks were to be brief, if bright.
I was curious about two things and asked the Falcon about both in his presser. I wondered how he felt, with the entire world calling for – and expecting – a TMF vs. Rafael Nadal final (Dirty Boy Rafa was just starting his bang-a-thon with Ivan Ljubicic so, at least theoretically, the issue was still undecided).
He said:
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I think Rome and Monte Carlo showed that we were sort of best players on clay this season, and that I could be expected, you know. Because not only are we No. 1 and No. 2 in the world, but also, let's say the best two on clay right now.
It's not like you're expecting some guys ranked much lower to make finals. We can cope with the pressure. I think for me, it was maybe little easier than for Nadal. He's not there yet. But I was always playing ahead of him so I could never I didn't have to bother what he was doing because I could really focus on my own game.
Yeah, so, I mean, I've come so far. Like I said before, it is a little bit of a surprise to me always when I can back up Grand Slam results like this. Now we'll see if he makes. It would be great.
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The other thing I asked was, now that he was in the final, who had Federer most feared going up against, on match day?
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I was not particularly confident against Berdych somehow. That was my feeling.
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Interesting answer, huh? And I’m so glad Federer didn’t come with this “Oh, you know, I took it one-match at a time. Everybody is dangerous. . . blah, blah, blah” baloney. He’s a classy guy. Ask a question, he looks you in the eye and gives you a straight answer.
Nalbandian came into the interview room shortly thereafter, and here's his immediate explanation of what happened:
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Well, the match with Davydenko, at 3 2 in the fourth sets, I mean, I feel something in the abs when I was serving. After everything that, we think with the doctors and we think with two days off will be recover for that. I do a lot of treatment and everything.
In the beginning of today, I feel hundred percent, I feel perfect. And then in the middle of the second set (serving at 3-1, the game in which he was broken), I feel it again much worse than Davydenko match. So was tough.
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Okay, perhapswas progressive, and the pain was manageable until he took his first medical time-out in the third set. But in the French portion of his presser, TMF made a surprisingly frank comment about the injury; he apparently said it was unusual for a player to get halfway through the match and then give up - and that if he were up 5-love in the final set, Nalbandian would not have quit.
Nalbandian took the high ground when he was asked about this:
So there it is. The Bull hath spoken. I have to admit, though, it makes me a little uncomfortable when I see someone default so soon after they were playing so well. I guess seeing people stagger around, make glaring errors, go to the towel to spit up, makes quitting in mid-match seem more acceptable.
One thing is for sure, this isn’t going to improve the reputation Nalbandian already enjoys as a head case.