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I got to the match (you know what match) in the middle of the first game. Watching a few points from the third row, my first reaction was that Roger Federer seemed to be hitting the ball well, moving crisply, and snapping both strokes with heavy, penetrating topspin. I thought we might have a repeat of his outstanding performance in the last round, against Nicolas Almagro. Then I looked up and the score was 2-0…for Filippo Volandri.
My initial reaction indicates the type of performance that Volandri turned in right from the start. Before Federer crumbled (and he did crumble, slowly but utterly), the Italian was on fire. He simply could not miss a forehand when he got a look at it, and his shots all found the lines. Even when Federer was broken again for 0-3, I thought it was just a temporary situation. I made a prediction to the writers around me that Federer would win the set 6-3. (And you know I'm very, very rarely wrong.)
Federer broke back for 1-3. But two important things happened in his next service game. First, Volandri's level didn't drop at all, which meant he probably wasn’t going to go away anytime soon. And Federer started to feel the pressure of his shots, which sent his game off the rails. He sailed a few routine ground strokes long, then changed racquets. It didn’t help. He was broken again and never got back on track.
“I know him and I’ve played a tough match against him a few years ago [in their only previous encounter, Federer beat Volandri 6-2 in the third set in Rome in 2003],” Federer said in his presser. “I played juniors with him and I know how tough it can be in Rome, so I was expecting a tough match.”
So he respected Volandri’s game, but I don’t think he expected anything like this. The Italian was totally loose as he closed out the first set, almost skipping into his crosscourt forehand. It looked like was he was reading Federer’s crosscourt forehand, a shot that typically gives him a quick advantage in any point. Instead, Volandri was the one smoking the ball into the crosscourt corner. Federer was a step behind it all afternoon.
Volandri blew two set points at 5-1 but used a surprisingly strong serve and that dialed-in forehand to finish it 6-2. “Filippo played well,” Federer reminded us. “He made it hard for me. He played well against Gasquet [in the last round], so I knew it would be tough. Give the guy some credit.”
As the second set began, I thought the match was still an even bet. This was Federer vs. Volandri, after all, No. 1 vs. No. 53, and I thought it was less about No. 1’s bad play than it was No. 53’s tree session. That changed with Federer serving at 1-1, 0-30. He missed a backhand long, but even worse, it looked like he was guiding the ball rather than going after it. In other words, he had lost confidence in it. That seemed to be confirmed on break point, when Federer had an open look at a pass and drilled a backhand into the tape.
Federer missed two more backhands to go down 3-1, and Volandri continued to nail his forehand to both corners at will. If Federer left the ball anywhere near the middle of the court, Volandri immediately gained the advantage. It’s hard to remember any points in the second set where Federer dictated play (when was the last time that happened?). At 4-3, Volandri was still lights out. Even after missing a forehand wide for 0-15, he didn’t stop attacking. He hit drilled a forehand for 15-15 and a hit a spectacular crosscourt winner for 40-15.
It’s one of the oddities—and beauties—of tennis, though, that when a lower-ranked guy is trying to serve out a match against a top player at 5-4 in the second set, the match suddenly rides on this one game. If the guy who was behind breaks, he's not just even; he's the front-runner. If Federer had broken Volandri for the first time all set at 5-4, you would have had to like his chances.
Volandri came out looking pretty calm, all things considered, strutting and flicking his racquet around like it was all in the bag. But he overhit a forehand wide for 15-15, then pushed one into the net, his worst forehand all day, for 15-30. He used a wide kick serve to make it 30-30. At this point, you might have expected Federer to show some emotion or try a grinding, make-him-win-it style or throw caution to the wind—something. I know those aren’t the Federer methods, but this was a feeble ending from the world’s best. He lofted a backhand well long for 40-30; then, on match point, when Volandri had to be shaking all over, Federer flicked a routine forehand into the net.
The crowd had been supportive all day, without going overboard. (I particularly liked two guys near me who, whenever Volandri won an important point, did a sort of running start out of their seats and straight into the railing in front of them.) After the last point, the audience let it all out. Volandri fell to the court, then high-fived the front row. An Italian folk song came on and had everyone singing. It segued into some techno, which had everyone dancing. A nice moment.
What can we profitably say about Federer’s performance? I was surprised by the number of people I talked to who asked me, “How could that happen?” Some people thought it had to be an injury (Federer said he was fine); the press sought vainly for an explanation for such a “shocking” event. I thought Federer said it best. “That’s tennis.” Anybody who’s ever played and lost knows that there no other explanations necessary.
Federer was asked when the last time was that he “didn’t feel his shots like that.”
“Happens, you know, a lot,” Federer said, “but sometimes I get through because I’m the better player or I played right at the right time. Today I just couldn’t get the teeth into the match at all. It was over in no time, and I was always the wall against the back.”
A highly honest—if a little malapropy—answer. It's not something any top pro wants to admit, but like everyone else, they have to muddle through a lot of matches without their best. Today, as Federer said, he met a guy “who was confident and knew he had a chance.”
OK, fine, but what can Federer take away from this? First-serve percentage, of course. He made 44 percent of them, and won just 37 percent of points played on his second serve. It’s tough to beat anyone on clay doing that, let alone a guy who was hot and at home. Beyond that, I felt like Federer's body language was bad. I had thought that was something only Nadal did to him, but it can happen against anyone.
This is Federer’s first loss on clay to someone other than Nadal in more than two years. That’s hard to believe—he certainly looked vulnerable on the stuff today. One basic problem is that he's not a grinding player who can rely on hitting a ton of balls and working his way into a match. “That’s tennis,” as Fed says, and you can’t argue with that. Losses happen. At the same time, you’d like to think he wouldn’t just see a loss coming, but show some visible sign he’s trying to avoid it.
Down side for Federer fans: There’s another guy in the French Open draw who knows he can beat Federer.
Bright side: He’s always loved Hamburg, and now he can play it.
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