Who would've guessed it? After reaching the semifinals or better in 23 consecutive Grand Slam events, Roger Federer has now lost in the quarterfinals in both the French Open and Wimbledon this year. Both times, he lost to a big guy with a big game - Robin Soderling hit him off the court in Roland Garros and Thomas Berdych took a page off Robin's book and did the same to Federer on Centre Court in Wimbledon.
This loss, as well as Novak Djokovic's advancement to the semifinals, means that for the first time since 2003, Roger Federer will be ranked outside the top two. When the rankings officially come out on Monday, Rafa Nadal will remain at #1 while Novak Djokovic goes up to #2, bumping Federer off to #3. Given that Roger started the year off with his 16th Grand Slam title at the Australian Open and was one win away from eclipsing Pete Sampras' men's record of 286 weeks at #1 (his loss to Soderling meant he is a week shy of equaling Pete), this turn of events is stunning.
I guess even Fed himself was stunned and was not that ready to deal with a loss, as evidenced by his not-so-gracious post-match interview. I guess you could argue that most great champions need to have that arrogance to stay at the top of the game, but what he said and how he said it was just a bit too distasteful for my liking.
Should be interesting to see how the rest of the season goes. I would be thrilled if Nadal can defend enough points until the end of the year to remain #1 at the end of the year. Would be even better if he manages to win Wimbledon (or the US Open!) along the way.
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