What did Stefan Edberg say to Roger Federer before he took the court on Monday?
Something to the effect of “Courage, mon brave,” judging by the way Federer kept rushing the net like a dervish.
The question is whether he will be as bold – or as clinical – against Andy Murray on Wednesday.
There is no such thing as a dull meeting between Federer and Murray, but this one promises to be especially fascinating.
If the 2014 Australian Open has been the tournament of the supercoaches, this will be its first superclash.
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20 Jan 2014This quarter-final might almost sound like a reconstruction staged by a historical society, given that Edberg and Ivan Lendl faced off no fewer than four times in Melbourne, withhonours shared at two wins apiece.
In broad terms, their modern charges look to follow the same patterns: Federer coming forward to volley like a more debonair Edberg, Murray pursuing the “power baseline” game that Lendl all but invented.
But if the outline might be familiar, the staging will be completely different. You might as well compare West Side Story to Romeo and Juliet.
Tennis culture evolves, and the best players evolve faster than the rest.
Indeed both Federer and Murray have moved on significantly since they last faced each other, in the semi-final of this event a year ago.
Federer has not just hired Edberg, but fixed his back trouble and switched to a larger, 98-inch racket, which has been working supremely well for him over the past week.
Lendl and company might not want to study Monday’s 6-3, 7-5, 6-4 victory over Jo-Wilfried Tsonga too closely, for fear of becoming demoralised.
It felt like a flashback to Federer’s salad days.
As for Murray, he has not just won Wimbledon but addressed a chronic injury of his own by having an irregular piece of bone shaved off one of his vertebrae.
He has returned to the tour with more mobility than we have seen from him in at least 18 months, particularly on his double-fisted backhand, which is now smoother and more adaptable. The downside is a lack of matches.
We saw a hint of this on Monday when Murray faced Stéphane Robert, the first lucky loser to reach the fourth round of the Australian Open, and a man who belongs on a different plane of the sport.
As Murray said: “I dominated 95 per cent of the match.” But the other five per cent arrived at an inconvenient moment.
At the end of the third set, Murray had two match points on his own serve at 5-4, and then two more in the tie-break, but allowed them all to slip away – an aberration that cost him an extra half-hour on court.
It was a good thing that in the fourth set his superior conditioning kicked in, as Robert started cramping and Murray – who had comprehensively destroyed one of his rackets just before it started – eased to a 6-1, 6-2, 6-7, 6-2 victory.
He still spent only 2hr 42min on Hisense Arena (half an hour less than Rafael Nadal needed to subdue Kei Nishikori in three sets on Monday), so that outbreak of ‘Fergie time’ was hardly a disaster.
But it was hard to imagine a fully match-tight Murray wasting so many opportunities.
Unless, of course, he happened to be playing Novak Djokovic in the Wimbledon final.
“I can’t honestly say my expectations are as high as if I’d been playing for the last four months,” Murray admitted.
“It’s been a good effort to get to the quarter-finals of a slam this soon after back surgery.
But now I’m not far away from winning the event. Anyone that’s in the quarters is close.”
Murray is covering all eventualities there.
But then, it has been hard to gauge the level of his tennis – probably even for Murray himself – because of the eccentric cast list thrown up by the draw.
Uniquely, in his history of 32 grand slams, he has faced three opponents outside the top 100.
While Murray was happy to ease his way into the tournament, this was not perhaps the ideal preparation for facing Federer – a shot-making genius whose new racket appears to have shaved at least a couple of years off his age.
“Roger took the ball very early today, and he was always taking my time away,” a chastened Tsonga said. “Everything was going quick. He was playing unbelievable.”
The odds must incline towards Federer, which is not something you would have anticipated when he blew up so horrendously against Tommy Robredo at the US Open.
That was only four months ago, and yet this great magician has shown an ability to regenerate that would impress Doctor Who.
Expect him to step into the court against Murray’s second serve – a long-time weakness that had improved significantly under Lendl’s guidance, but appears to have regressed again during Murray’s time off.
Against Robert, Murray averaged 82mph on the second serve, and won 52 per cent of the points.
Federer’s equivalent figures were 94mph and 69 per cent, even though he was facing a much stronger opponent.
“I like playing the best,” Federer said, sounding more bullish than he has for a while.
“And you need to take it to them. You need to play aggressive against the top guys, me included.
"You don’t want to wait for stuff to happen. I think that usually is good for success.”
Murray’s record against Federer is a mixed one: 11 wins from 20 meetings, but only one win from four meetings in the grand slams.
That came here, in last year’s semi-final, when Federer became so frustrated that he blurted an unprintable epithet in Murray’s direction.
Since then, the great man has been short of form and certainty.
But whoever wins, the conclusion will be the same. “He’s back.”
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