He is a sportsman who has tumbled myriad numbers and stacked them high in the course of his near two-decade long career. Yet, as Roger Federer comes back to the hustle and bustle of mainstream tennis – after a six-month injury lay-off instead of the customary two-month off-season break – he finds himself in an unfamiliar, yet welcoming, numerical territory that has put him in consideration for a fifth Australian Open title despite the fact that he’s still an outsider looking in, at the 17th place in the seeding.
The Pete Sampras connect
There’s a lapse of almost 15 years since Federer missed out on being seeded inside the top-10 in a Major. The last time that it happened, at the 2002 US Open, where he was seeded 13th, the Swiss made it to the fourth round before losing to Belarusian Max Mirnyi. Inconsequential as the tournament is for the 35-year-old in terms of his result, its history – buried under the debris of tennis’ continuity – has, however, come to hold particular significance this year.
The 2002 US Open had the most unlikely champion emerge at the end of the requisite two weeks in the (then) 31-year-old Pete Sampras. The American, while no stranger to winning Slams or the US Open, had started to fall short by his own exalted standards, since winning his 13th Major two years previously, in 2002, at Wimbledon. He had separated himself from his rivals with his invincibility, but as time slowed him down, Sampras’s dominance had began to look like a throwback to his past rather than the mainstay of his present. His losses in consecutive finals at Flushing Meadows in 2000 and 2001 to first-time Major champions, too, then laid down the terms of the changing times of the tennis world, instead of insinuating about his longevity.
As the 17th seed going into the US Open in 2002, Sampras’s longevity perhaps would have been the farthest thought of consideration with the likes of Lleyton Hewitt, the defending champion, Marat Safin and Andre Agassi featuring in the forefront of the tournament action. While the exodus of seeds hastily dropping out of the event captivated attention, the erstwhile favourite, and four-time former champion, went about repainting the picture of what he had represented in – and for – the sport, not that long ago.
Sampras’s eventual win in the final over compatriot Agassi followed a predictable pattern that had been established in the years past. Analogously, his victory also veered drastically from the preset expectations of top-seeds being the ideal tournament favourites.
The parallel and variances between Sampras and Federer
In a quirk, Federer vis-à-vis the rest of the current players’ block finds himself treading the same road as Sampras, his idol and the man whom he beat to claim his initial recognition in the game. Once a force-to-be-reckoned-with, the 35-year-old has come to be looked upon as a has-been with older foes and younger upstarts gaining on him.
And, just like Sampras at the US Open all those years ago, Federer too stands at the outlier of favouritism at Melbourne Park, seeded 17th with those ranked above him predicted to do better and go deeper in the draw. While the seeds standing in Federer’s path won’t be as fickle in their performances as the ones during Sampras’s brief run as the underdog, the Swiss could still end up having a historic tryst with success given his unusual antecedents with Sampras’s record-making.
Since he was anointed as Sampras’s successor to lead the tennis pack, Federer has systematically crossed each of the American’s well-rooted thresholds and as such it would be one more addition to the pile. Though, its peculiarity, if he does achieve the title run, will indeed be quite a context to remark upon.
To that end, Federer’s chances of winning his 18th Slam have also been influenced by an atypical alignment of numerals around him, totalling to his – self-confessed – lucky number eight. From the year’s annotation by way of his Slam wins jutting towards his seeding, 17 has been a conspicuous constant. And, focused though he would be in getting his Australian Open campaign underway, the occurrence is too remarkable to not pay attention to.
If the Swiss No. 2 does end up being the last man standing on the second Sunday at the Rod Laver Arena, it will give a glimpse of the last remaining vestiges of his resolve to keep on playing, further distinguishing himself from Sampras, who chose to end his career after his 14th Major. It would also be a timely deliverance of fortuitousness tilting the scale evenly after the outlandish manner in which Federer’s career was stalled, right after this tournament, the season prior.