It was difficult not to smile when Roger Federer, contemplating the task that remains if he is to win a record eighth gentlemen’s singles title at Wimbledon, was making himself sound like some sort of tennis Gulliver stuck in a Brobdingnag world of monstrous-serving, white-shirted giants.
“These other guys are all big hitters,” mused Federer, reflecting on the challenge posed today by Tomas Berdych, his semi-final opponent, and the other last four combatants, Sam Querrey and Marin Cilic.
“They've got big serves, big forehands. All three guys are taller and stronger than I am. I’ve got to figure out a different way, carve my way through the draw somehow with my slice and my spins, my consistency maybe.”
He could almost have convinced us he was having to flit around to dodge sand being kicked in his face. Yet, of course, this just won’t do. Everyone appreciates that there’s one true giant in this final quartet, and, with respect to this fine trio with 39 titles between them, it’s not Querrey nor Cilic, both 6ft 6in, nor the 6ft 5in Berdych. It’s Federer who will take all the slaying.
Just ask Milos Raonic. He came armed with his 140mph tracers, only to be rendered impotent by Federer’s still wondrous reflexes that enable him to tease the initial huge strike back into play and then start manoeuvring his less mobile prey around before striking as swiftly and cleanly as if he were wielding a light sabre.
“OK, let's see if he can do it again. Let's see if he can do it again,” the Canadian would keep telling himself, thinking Federer’s sorcery couldn’t last. “He kept doing it…”
Between them, the trio attempting to thwart the Swiss have played him 34 times and and have lost 27 times. It feels as if he has them all covered. He’ll see the trio’s 18,714 aces and raise them 10,045 of his own. Imagine, a semi-final quartet with 28,759 career aces between them.
Berdych, so delighted to be back in business after a fairly miserable year in which he’s slumped to his worst ranking in seven years, has a simple take on the challenge that awaits on Centre Court. He is, he says, being asked to beat “the greatest of them all”.
I'm ranked 26. Pretty good grass court player. That's about it
Mind you, it must have been easy for the Czech to feel that way after being dismantled in their last Grand Slam meeting in Melbourne in January in a manner that felt almost too cruel. Yet Berdych, rejuvenated by his new coaching partnership with old playing pal Martin Stepanek, must still come equipped with hope, fortified by the distant memory of his 2010 run to the final here when, en route, he beat Federer – not to mention the more recent encouragement of having held match points this season against the Swiss in Miami.
Yet before 35-year-old Federer sets out to follow the lead set by another evergreen wonder, ladies’ finalist Venus Williams, by becoming the oldest men’s singles finalist since Ken Rosewall in 1974, he and Berdych may need to take War and Peace into the locker room to idle away the hours as they wait for Cilic and Querrey to conduct business.
This pair don’t do short and sharp. Their two previous Wimbledon contests were five-setters and their five-and-half hour 2012 epic, won 17-15 in the fifth set by Cilic, is still the longest match ever to be started and finished in a single day at Wimbledon, and the second longest of all after the John Isner-Nicolas Mahut 11-hour marathon.
Federer senses that Cilic may not too far away from recapturing the irresistible form that drove him to the US Open title in 2014. Cilic has won all four meetings but accepts that Querrey “can hurt anyone in the game”, as the last two Wimbledon champions can attest.
And hurt a nation too, apparently. Not that the Californian, having put Andy Murray out of his limping misery, cared a hoot about whether he would be perceived as the man who shot Bambi.
“Everyone needs to take a little chill pill. It’s fine,” he suggested jovially and, having taken his advice, we recognise that someone who doubted he’d ever reach a Grand Slam semi-final but has done so at the 42nd time of asking is a man worth getting behind.
After his win over Murray, somebody asked Querrey to describe himself. “I'm ranked 26. Pretty good grass court player. That's about it…” he responded. Really? Star of reality TV, tireless charity worker, courageous comeback man after falling through a glass table and suffering serious nerve damage to his racket arm, and now conqueror of Wimbledon champions. We keep finding there’s more to big Sam than meets the eye.
