Another Epic Contest

Why can’t all Sunday television be as exciting as this? I’d gladly sit through a Roger Federer/Rafael Nadal 5-set classic for 52 consecutive weeks. Their contest on Sunday morning was not as good as their previous meeting, almost amazingly, back at Wimbledon but it was definitely up there as one of the greatest finals, of the modern era at least. There just seems to be something when these two square off against each other that they really bring their top game. Perhaps it’s not wanting to show weakness to your arch rival or just that there is so much at stake with a Grand Slam on the line.

In all honesty, the Australian Open needed a match of this calibre to close out the tournament after an extremely poor and one-sided women’s contest. Where is the value in a final when the first set only lasts 22 minutes? But full credit to Nadal for ultimately triumphing. He had a day’s less rest than Federer, not to mention his semi-final lasted around 5-and-a-quarter hours which was the longest in the history of the Australian Open.

For Federer though, it will be an extremely hard defeat to take and it was evident in his speech after the match when he had to take a moment to collect himself. He was favourite beforehand and he almost certainly had more energy going in due to the extra rest day, but he lost. In fact, Rafael Nadal is the only person to have beaten Federer in Grand Slam finals and that will no doubt start to niggle at him if they were to meet again. Federer will need to regroup, but unfortunately for him the next major is the French clay courts at Roland Garros, which is Nadal’s speciality. And currently, for Federer to win that one would be considered a fairly big shock.