It’s the beauty of sports, the thrill of the shock — an inexplicable loss, upset city. Roger Federer is so good, so solid, so consistent and predictable: pencil the guy into the final. But even though his play is heavenly, he’s still a man. Even though he’s weathered more storms than a Cape Cod trawler, he’s still skin and bones.
And on a still but stunning Indian Wells night, his play was uncertain; his resolve wavered. We presumed that even if this battle with the appealing Cypriot vet Marcos Baghdatis went to the bitter end, form would hold. The Swiss mountain man would prevail.
But no. On his first match point, Federer’s running forehand flew long. Then Crete Baghdatis, who’s actually Parisian, forced a backhand error. But not to worry, a third match point came. But so too it went awry, as Fed netted a backhand. The sky was falling. And with an imposing 135 mph serve down the T, Baggy’s stunning 5-7, 7-5, 7-6(4) win left the Tennis Garden crowd breathless and media nerds scurrying for stats. The ’06 Australian Open finalist (yes, he lost to Fed) came into the contest 0-6 against No. 1s. Marcos, who famously cramped against Andre Agassi in a semi-classic U.S. Open five-setter (a match that proved to be Andre’s last win), last scored a win over a top-10 player in Marseille in ’08 over Mikhail Youzhny.
After his loss, Fed all but sprinted to the interview room and offered, with a hint of sorrow, a range of views on the match.
•”I used up too many chances. Comebacks…haunt you. But he hung in there. It wasn’t the worst match…I did many good things tonight but also many bad things. It’s just a question of not letting that happen too often…I wasn’t playing all that great, and then I could have still won the match…It’s a pity because I wasn’t terrible.”
•”[Having those three match points], that’s the tough part. When you come back from a long break, sometimes it happens automatically that you’re back in it; and then sometimes I already felt against Victor Hanescu I was doing many right things, but then the next thing you know I’m stuck in a third set and you never know what’s going to happen…I just couldn’t find the way to win. I was maybe one shot away…You can’t say I played a bad match, and if I win I’m going to tell you it’s a good match. It was a decent match, but maybe wrong choices at the wrong time. Maybe going for too much, maybe playing too passively.”
•”It wasn’t the greatest match of all time I think from his side, either. The Australian Open final was much higher quality. Just because he beat me doesn’t mean he’s played the match of his life. He’s a good player. He’s played many of the top guys. Tonight he just hung in there, and that was enough.”
*”I think as the tournament would have gone forward I would have found my groove more and more, and who knows what would have happened? But I don’t need to worry about that anymore. It’s about resting…because I do feel the first match in my body. It’s something that always is tough, coming from a long layover and all of a sudden playing matches. But, yeah, I mean, the season is long, like you say. There’s no need to panic here…I should never be in a breaker, you know. So why analyze the breaker? That’s the way I analyze tennis.”
In contrast to Fed, Baggy was, of course, elated. Yes, Roger played too aggressively, but the Cypriot pointed to his own calm, his focus and maturity. The man who in ’09 had been injured and had seen his ranking dip to triple digits, had brought a new team around him. He wisely chose to play a string of humble Challengers, even in rough-and-gruff Uzbekistan. Now he was seeing big dividends. This was the greatest win of his life. Like Andy Roddick, he said the best part of tennis is the 10 or 15 seconds after a big win. But he could not put his glee into words.
It was a singular triumph. But tennis is unforgiving. Next he’s got the little known but always-dangerous Tommy Robredo. But Baggy just smiles. He’ll just go through his usual drill: wake up, play soccer, eat, warm-up, play and hopefully build on the sweetest moment of his 24-year life
