WIMBLEDON, ENGLAND — As the rain gave way, if only briefly, to sunshine and the Wimbledon men’s final approached, lovers, friends and families took their turns posing in front of the Fred Perry statue that is on display outside Centre Court.
Perry’s statue has been a photo opportunity for years at the All England Club, but this was the day when Perry, the last British man to win the singles title here, could finally get company in earnest: the day when Andy Murray was about to play the final against Roger Federer.
A Murray victory would have been quite something; a national moment; a thunderous start to London’s Olympic summer. But nobody in men’s tennis does history quite as well as Federer, and though Murray played brilliantly, even bravely, at times in this outdoor-indoor final, Federer was the one who ended up falling to the grass with release and delight with milestones aplenty to celebrate.
Federer’s 4-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-4 victory gave him a seventh Wimbledon singles title, which ties the all-time men’s record shared by William Renshaw and Pete Sampras. It also guaranteed that Federer, who will turn 31 next month, would reclaim the No. 1 ranking on Monday.
“It’s amazing,” Federer said of winning for the seventh time. “It equals me with Pete Sampras, who’s my hero.”
It was also Federer’s 17th Grand Slam singles title, padding his lead in the all-time standings. But this victory, though far from the most significant or emotional of his career, was particularly reaffirming because it was his first major title in over two years.
He last won a “major” at the 2010 Australian Open. Though he has continued to pile up tournament victories on the regular circuit in best-of-three-set events, he has been eclipsed at the Grand Slam events in the last two years by rivals Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal.
But Wimbledon, the oldest of the Grand Slam tournaments and the only one played on grass, remains beautifully suited to Federer’s Swiss army knife of a skill set: his foot speed and innate grace on the run, his first-strike instincts, his medley of options off his single-handed backhand, his ability to improvise off a bad bounce and perhaps his sense of traditionalism as well.
A former junior hothead who has become a remarkably self-contained champion, he enjoys the decorum; the dress code and the sense that Centre Court is as much a theater as a stadium. Though he was upset in the quarterfinals here the last two years, blowing a two-set lead last year against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, he has had many more triumphant days than disastrous ones on the court where a phrase from Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If” is posted at the entrance.
He won his first title here in 2003 and then won in 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007 before Nadal stopped him in the gloaming in an epic final that is widely and rightly considered one of the finest matches of all time. Federer won again in 2009, and this victory means that he will tie Sampras’s record for 286 total weeks with the top ranking.
“As we know, the world number one you don’t get those gifted; I was up two sets to love in the quarters here last year and two sets to love up at the U.S. Open,” Federer said, referring to his loss to Novak Djokovic in the U.S. Open semifinals.
“So many chances if you like,” Federer said. “Maybe I got nervous, maybe the other guys were just too good you know. But I never stopped believing, and I started playing more even though I have a family. I don’t know. It all worked out. I got great momentum, got great confidence and it all came together. It’s just a magical moment for me.”
The final on Sunday started outdoors but was stopped because of rain at 1-all in the third set after two hours and two minutes of play with Federer serving at 40-0. The decision was quickly made to close the retractable roof over Centre Court and when Federer and Murray resumed play 40 minutes later, they were playing indoors.
Before the break, the level of play was, at times, phenomenal, with extended rallies and a surplus of forced errors as Murray, one of the fastest and most consistent men in the game, forced Federer to hit extra groundstrokes and even extra overheads from what would usually be winning positions.
But after the break, Federer, who has been the most successful indoor player in the world for most of his career, lifted his game to a higher level without wind, sun or other distractions. His forehand, in particular, was more penetrating and the match finally turned for good in Federer’s direction with Murray serving at 2-3 in the third set.
Federer required 10 deuces and six break points to finally finish off the break, as Murray ended up on the grass on three different occasions: twice from slipping and once from diving to his right deep behind the baseline and ending up on his back with both legs pointing back over his head.
It was perhaps the first time any tennis star has been in quite that position on Centre Court, and Murray’s position would never be comfortable again after Federer closed out the game with a forehand that forced a backhand error.
“When the roof closed, he played unbelievable tennis,” Murray said.
Tennis fans worldwide will miss Federer, his class and his beautiful game, when he retires, but one suspects that Murray will miss him rather less. The 25-year-old Scot has now lost to Federer in three Grand Slam singles finals —the 2008 US Open, the 2010 Australian Open and this Wimbledon — and Murray has now lost his first four major finals over all. The only other man in the Open era to lose his first four major singles finals is Ivan Lendl, who ultimately won eight major titles and has been coaching Murray since last December.
But Murray has yet to make his breakthrough, and it was perfectly understandable that he struggled to keep his emotions in check as he addressed the Centre Court crowd after the match. Even if he had become the first British man to reach the final since Henry “Bunny” Austin in 1938, this still felt like a letdown.
“I’m getting closer,” the fourth-seeded Murray said through the tears, with his mother, Judy Murray, and girlfriend, Kim Sears, crying in the players’ box along with quite a few fans with no direct connections to Murray.
“I’d like to congratulate Roger,” Murray said when he finally recovered his composure. “I was getting asked the other day after I won my semifinals, ‘Is this your best chance? Roger’s 30 now.’ He’s not bad for a 30-year-old. He played a great tournament. I thought he had some struggles early on with his back and showed what fight he still has left in him. So congratulations, you deserve it.”
Considering the hurricane-force of some of the manias that have swept British popular culture, Murray-mania might be too strong a term for what happened before Sunday’s final in this island nation.
But there was certainly massive interest, to borrow a British adjective, and hundreds of fans were prepared to camp out in the field across Church Road in the soggy days and nights before Sunday’s final in the hope of getting a grounds pass into the All England Club and the chance to watch the match on a big-screen television from Aorangi Terrace, the sloping picnic lawn better known as “Henman Hill” after the former British player Tim Henman.
“We were just watching the semifinal on TV, and when Andy Murray won, we thought we should jump in the car and join the queue,” said Dan Golding, a 23-year-old from Bath, England. “It was just a seed of a thought and then it swayed us when he finally, definitely got there and the reality hit home.”
Golding’s friend Rosie Erwin, a 23-year-old nurse with “Murray Me” painted on her face, said that she and Golding wanted to be “part of the history.
But as they camped out in the rain for two nights, they also discovered that not everyone in the nearby tents was a Murray fan.
“There were some guys behind us who were Americans who are supporting Fed,” Golding said.
It is another testimony to the appeal of Federer’s game and personality that he has managed to divide loyalties even when playing tennis stars in their home countries. It has happened at the French Open when he has faced the likes of Gael Monfils in big, second-week matches. And though Murray was unquestionably the crowd favorite, the atmosphere in Centre Court was not quite a wall of pro-Murray sound.
There were two shouts of “I love you, Roger,” in the second game alone.
Perry’s statue has been a photo opportunity for years at the All England Club, but this was the day when Perry, the last British man to win the singles title here, could finally get company in earnest: the day when Andy Murray was about to play the final against Roger Federer.
A Murray victory would have been quite something; a national moment; a thunderous start to London’s Olympic summer. But nobody in men’s tennis does history quite as well as Federer, and though Murray played brilliantly, even bravely, at times in this outdoor-indoor final, Federer was the one who ended up falling to the grass with release and delight with milestones aplenty to celebrate.
Federer’s 4-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-4 victory gave him a seventh Wimbledon singles title, which ties the all-time men’s record shared by William Renshaw and Pete Sampras. It also guaranteed that Federer, who will turn 31 next month, would reclaim the No. 1 ranking on Monday.
“It’s amazing,” Federer said of winning for the seventh time. “It equals me with Pete Sampras, who’s my hero.”
It was also Federer’s 17th Grand Slam singles title, padding his lead in the all-time standings. But this victory, though far from the most significant or emotional of his career, was particularly reaffirming because it was his first major title in over two years.
He last won a “major” at the 2010 Australian Open. Though he has continued to pile up tournament victories on the regular circuit in best-of-three-set events, he has been eclipsed at the Grand Slam events in the last two years by rivals Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal.
But Wimbledon, the oldest of the Grand Slam tournaments and the only one played on grass, remains beautifully suited to Federer’s Swiss army knife of a skill set: his foot speed and innate grace on the run, his first-strike instincts, his medley of options off his single-handed backhand, his ability to improvise off a bad bounce and perhaps his sense of traditionalism as well.
A former junior hothead who has become a remarkably self-contained champion, he enjoys the decorum; the dress code and the sense that Centre Court is as much a theater as a stadium. Though he was upset in the quarterfinals here the last two years, blowing a two-set lead last year against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, he has had many more triumphant days than disastrous ones on the court where a phrase from Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If” is posted at the entrance.
He won his first title here in 2003 and then won in 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007 before Nadal stopped him in the gloaming in an epic final that is widely and rightly considered one of the finest matches of all time. Federer won again in 2009, and this victory means that he will tie Sampras’s record for 286 total weeks with the top ranking.
“As we know, the world number one you don’t get those gifted; I was up two sets to love in the quarters here last year and two sets to love up at the U.S. Open,” Federer said, referring to his loss to Novak Djokovic in the U.S. Open semifinals.
“So many chances if you like,” Federer said. “Maybe I got nervous, maybe the other guys were just too good you know. But I never stopped believing, and I started playing more even though I have a family. I don’t know. It all worked out. I got great momentum, got great confidence and it all came together. It’s just a magical moment for me.”
The final on Sunday started outdoors but was stopped because of rain at 1-all in the third set after two hours and two minutes of play with Federer serving at 40-0. The decision was quickly made to close the retractable roof over Centre Court and when Federer and Murray resumed play 40 minutes later, they were playing indoors.
Before the break, the level of play was, at times, phenomenal, with extended rallies and a surplus of forced errors as Murray, one of the fastest and most consistent men in the game, forced Federer to hit extra groundstrokes and even extra overheads from what would usually be winning positions.
But after the break, Federer, who has been the most successful indoor player in the world for most of his career, lifted his game to a higher level without wind, sun or other distractions. His forehand, in particular, was more penetrating and the match finally turned for good in Federer’s direction with Murray serving at 2-3 in the third set.
Federer required 10 deuces and six break points to finally finish off the break, as Murray ended up on the grass on three different occasions: twice from slipping and once from diving to his right deep behind the baseline and ending up on his back with both legs pointing back over his head.
It was perhaps the first time any tennis star has been in quite that position on Centre Court, and Murray’s position would never be comfortable again after Federer closed out the game with a forehand that forced a backhand error.
“When the roof closed, he played unbelievable tennis,” Murray said.
Tennis fans worldwide will miss Federer, his class and his beautiful game, when he retires, but one suspects that Murray will miss him rather less. The 25-year-old Scot has now lost to Federer in three Grand Slam singles finals —the 2008 US Open, the 2010 Australian Open and this Wimbledon — and Murray has now lost his first four major finals over all. The only other man in the Open era to lose his first four major singles finals is Ivan Lendl, who ultimately won eight major titles and has been coaching Murray since last December.
But Murray has yet to make his breakthrough, and it was perfectly understandable that he struggled to keep his emotions in check as he addressed the Centre Court crowd after the match. Even if he had become the first British man to reach the final since Henry “Bunny” Austin in 1938, this still felt like a letdown.
“I’m getting closer,” the fourth-seeded Murray said through the tears, with his mother, Judy Murray, and girlfriend, Kim Sears, crying in the players’ box along with quite a few fans with no direct connections to Murray.
“I’d like to congratulate Roger,” Murray said when he finally recovered his composure. “I was getting asked the other day after I won my semifinals, ‘Is this your best chance? Roger’s 30 now.’ He’s not bad for a 30-year-old. He played a great tournament. I thought he had some struggles early on with his back and showed what fight he still has left in him. So congratulations, you deserve it.”
Considering the hurricane-force of some of the manias that have swept British popular culture, Murray-mania might be too strong a term for what happened before Sunday’s final in this island nation.
But there was certainly massive interest, to borrow a British adjective, and hundreds of fans were prepared to camp out in the field across Church Road in the soggy days and nights before Sunday’s final in the hope of getting a grounds pass into the All England Club and the chance to watch the match on a big-screen television from Aorangi Terrace, the sloping picnic lawn better known as “Henman Hill” after the former British player Tim Henman.
“We were just watching the semifinal on TV, and when Andy Murray won, we thought we should jump in the car and join the queue,” said Dan Golding, a 23-year-old from Bath, England. “It was just a seed of a thought and then it swayed us when he finally, definitely got there and the reality hit home.”
Golding’s friend Rosie Erwin, a 23-year-old nurse with “Murray Me” painted on her face, said that she and Golding wanted to be “part of the history.
But as they camped out in the rain for two nights, they also discovered that not everyone in the nearby tents was a Murray fan.
“There were some guys behind us who were Americans who are supporting Fed,” Golding said.
It is another testimony to the appeal of Federer’s game and personality that he has managed to divide loyalties even when playing tennis stars in their home countries. It has happened at the French Open when he has faced the likes of Gael Monfils in big, second-week matches. And though Murray was unquestionably the crowd favorite, the atmosphere in Centre Court was not quite a wall of pro-Murray sound.
There were two shouts of “I love you, Roger,” in the second game alone.