The Australian was just not as big a deal in those days. And the prize money was certainly less, which may have made some of the top non-Aussie players say “I’m not making that long-ass trip!”
Even at the end of his career, Agassi played competitively with Federer. He didn’t have the variety to beat him and Federer moved to well to be worn down by Agassi’s ground strokes, but if you put the 1995 or 1999/2000 version of Agassi against today’s Federer you’d definitely get some intense and competitive matches.
I don’t think anything but relentless returning could work. Or, you could take him back to pre-composite days, when tennis players had to have finesse. Even then he’d be formidable, though.
No, you would have a Federer. From the Roddick match the other night he had better serve placement, his foot speed is like Blake and his ground strokes are like Agassi. So I see a tie.
I thought Agassi’s commentary during the match on Wednesday about the range that Fed can hit the ball was interesting. Agassi said something like he can hit with placement from the ground to the shoulders, and what makes him really special is he can hit with placement far in front and far behind as well.
But, to answer the OP, the best way to beat him is to allow him to get old, tired and worn out, then find the phenominal player of the next generation. The guy is absolutley incredible and barring injury should be unbeatble for a while more. I enjoy watching him, even though I was routing for Roddick a couple nights ago.
Given David Foster Wallace’s obsession with tennis, and his amazing writing skills, it seems only natural that he would write this column in the NYT about Federer. There are sections of his book Infinite Jest that talk about the same sort of tennis player. If you’re going to beat Federer at tennis, you can’t go reading articles like this – you’ll be convinced that he’s unbeatable.
What’s strange is he was a baseliner-and won Wimbledon, a volleyer’s paradise, 5 times. My WAG for the Australian is the same reason few American pros went to the British (golf) Open before Arnie in 1961-too far away and inconvenient, low prestige.
I’ve made two seperate attempts to get through Infinite Jest…you’ve just convinced me to go for try number 3… DFW is by far my favorite contemporary writer.
Yep, I put five pounds on Federer to win in straight sets at that point, at odds of 54/1.
As for how to beat Federer, the best suggestion I have heard (unrelated to Federer) was “wear down the opponent by perfecting the art of dispatching an unending succession of let-cord services”…
