Wimbledon 2010: The Writing On The Wall For Federer?

The sky over Centre Court was about to be rent asunder today, roof or no roof. The forehand was misfiring, the backhand was leaking errors, the serve lacked its usual pop, and Mirka had a look on her face that seemed to suggest that there was something giving off a disgustingly unpleasant odor right under her nose. Suddenly, all those chants of “Roger Federer has never played a bad match at Wimbeldon”, “Federer can sleepwalk through most of his matches on grass” and “this is freaking Wimbledon dude, Federer CANNOT go out early” that were so nonchalantly bandied about before the tournament began, started to ring hollow. Just how close did Alejandro Falla get to send the defending champion and 6-time winner packing in the first round? Perhaps this will give an indication – by the end of the fourth set, Federer was either slicing or sending off-place flicks off the backhand wing on almost all points, going around his backhand on the return of serve like a man possessed and scampering around the court as though hanging on for dear life. Falla, that unknown 65^th-ranked Colombian journeyman who’s never won an ATP title, had Federer on the ropes, and Federer knew it. And the millions of spectators around the world could barely believe their eyes.

Federer managed to eke out the win eventually, coming through 5-7, 4-6, 6-4, 7-6(1), 6-0. Usually in a comeback of this sort it is tempting to shower plaudits on the winner for his never-say-die attitude and for his composure under pressure. Heck, the scoreline suggests that this was a ‘Serena moment’ for Federer the like of which he’d never had before. But that, alas, would only be wishful thinking. As harsh as it sounds to say this about a 16-time Grand Slam champion, Federer was stupendously unimpressive today. His shots simply didn’t have enough juice on them to consistently cause Falla problems, and many of his winning shots came off bad bounces or were plain old mishits. Some of his returns of serve that he attempted by running around his backhand ended up being unintentional lobs, and the backhand half-volleys that he can usually flick at such sharp angles floated in the air for eternity, eventually landing right in Falla’s strike zone for easy putaways. Even his serve that is normally so indefatigable under pressure was being gobbled up by Falla with contempt. In short, Federer was putting on a display that, at times, made us wonder how in holy hail this same man could have been the No.1 player in the world for all those trillion or so weeks.

When Falla was serving for the match at 5-4 in the fourth set, you sensed that the only way Federer could make a comeback in the match was if Falla started choking spectacularly. And fortunately for the Federer camp, that is precisely what happened. Falla’s legs were the first to give way, and Federer astutely decided to make his opponent run around every inch of the court, bringing out the wildly spinning slices and dropshots. Falla’s accuracy was the next to go – the shots that were being hammered so close to the lines through the first four sets started missing by miles. Finally, towards the tail end of the fifth set, Falla had no heart left in him either, waving the white flag after more than 3 hours of valiant shot-making and courageous fight. The 6-0 final set score is more a reflection of Falla’s flagging spirit than of any particular brilliance from Federer. Can anyone say that Federer has never played a bad match at Wimbledon any more?

During the match there was talk among the watchers that if Falla managed to pull off the win, this would qualify as the second biggest upset in tennis history after Martina Navratilova’s loss at the French Open in 1983, the year Navratilova went 86-0 in all the other matches she played. Federer avoided that kind of monumental upheaval today, but the state of his game doesn’t bode well for the rest of his tournament, or even for the rest of his career. I’m not one to jump to doomsday predictions on the basis of just one match, but this is not exactly a doomsday prediction I’m making here. Let’s face it – Federer is already almost universally recognized as the best player to have ever picked up a racquet, and he’s got pretty much nothing left to prove. But make no mistake, he is getting old. His footwork, as was amply clear today, will never have the same magically swift quality that it once had, and there’s no way for his focus and motivation to go but down. And oh, the man is in serious danger of getting overpowered, in terms of pure muscle and raw power, against nearly every young top player (admittedly, Falla is no teenage phenom, but he’s got some muscle, that guy). Federer has made a habit of proving the naysayers wrong, a habit most vividly demonstrated at this year’s Australian Open. Will he pick up his game in his beloved ‘home’, the prestigious All-England Club, and make yet another winning run to the title, in the process emphatically making his doubters eat crow? I, for one, am not holding my breath.