The greatest player in the history of the game has finally been vanquished. Wows!
Tennis is certainly privileged to see two outstanding champions at the same time. Considering they are only 27 and 22, by the time they are done, surely it would rank as the greatest rivalry this game has seen.
But for now, Rafa owns the world!
Filed under: Sports
Rafa, you beauty? or brute? beast, even?
How about Ramanathan Krishnan?
Partho,
heh.. maybe… but he looks less like a brute then some of the pumped up players in the women’s circuit..
Saying this is the greatest final ever is being unfair to some of the other finals that have taken place in the past. I can just recall a few off the head that were equally riveting
Borg vs mckenro 1980 and 81
Becker VS Edberg 1990
Ivanasevic vs Agassi 1992
Ivansevic VS Rafter 2001
It is very difficult to acknowledge that Federer is the greatest player ever because he has not won a French open. Borg won 5 Winbledons and 6 French Opens. It is incredibly to win French and Wimbledon in the same year because of the limited time between the 2 tournaments and also the difference in nature of the surfaces.
people argue that competition has got tougher in recent times, but that is not a valid arguement. You dont control the period in which you play and the opponents you play against.
Ramo, using your logic, this is only the second Grand Slam tournament that Rafa has won (all his previous titles were only on clay at French Open), whereas Federer has already won three different Grand Slams *multiple* times. Also, how many consecutive appearances in Grand Slam semi-finals and finals has Federer made, and how does that stack up with other tennis greats? I think that level of consistency is most likely unparalleled in tennis history in the open era.
While it’s always debatable whether someone is the *greatest* player or not (and it’s subjective), there’s no doubt that Federer is up there with the legends as *one* of the greatest players tennis has ever seen. I think Rafa is catching up fast, but he still needs to win US Open, Australian Open and Masters Cup before he can claim to be one of the greatest. He’s undoubtedly, the king on clay.
Amit,
I never said anything about Rafa, I just said it is not fair to consider Federer to be the greatest of all time without the French Open in his kitty. I dont know how you came to the conclusion that I implied Rafa is greater than Federer by my statement. Despite this victory Rafa has a lot to prove and is less accomplished than Federer as of now. If you want to look at someone for consistency look at Lendl never lost a single tournament before the semi finals for close to 10 years, that does not make him the Greatest player ever. I consider Borg’s 5 consecutive wimbledons and 6 consecutive French Opens to be one of the greatest achievements (something Federer is not close to achieveing and probably will never will) due to reasons I mentioned in my previous post. Again dont come to the conclusion by this statement I am implying Borg is greater than Federer. Confused had written federer is the greatest player in the history of the game and I just posted to get across the point that it is unfair to consider him the greatest ever because there are so many variables to consider.
And yeah I know, I make too many spelling mistakes
Ramo,
That’s, indeed, an excellent point.
Federer could be mentally much tougher than Borg. And this new generaton players-cum-performers, let’s not forget, are still trying to make a run at the legends’ mark, either to equal or to better..the benchmarks were set sometime ago. The comparisons should hold true to a point and the history of the game is being enriched robustly enough by the new gen.
I feel it’s unfair to conclude that
Title winners = Greatest Players
perhaps, Gasquet fan (who is a player) would have some points to highlight over here..the rest of us, higher order (first order or second order) or lower order game enthusiasts