Roger Federer capped a glorious year by defeating Lleyton Hewitt 6-3, 6-2 in the final of the year-end Tennis Masters Cup in Houston yesterday.
The match -- rain-delayed by three hours, rain-interrupted for 80 minutes and reduced to a best two-of-three sets -- allowed the Wimbledon, U.S. Open and Australian Open champion to move his head-to-head over Hewitt to 8-7. He prevailed in all six of their 2004 encounters.
Federer established an Open-era (since 1968) record by winning his 13th final in a row, breaking a record he shared with Bjorn Borg and John McEnroe. It was also his 23rd consecutive victory, dating back 13 months, over a top-10-ranked player.
A torn left thigh muscle last month resulted in Federer not playing a tournament match in 43 days going into the Masters Cup, but he hardly missed a beat and took home a winner's cheque of $1.52-million (U.S.) In the semi-finals on Saturday, he advanced 6-3, 7-6 (20-18) over Marat Safin, while Hewitt plundered victory from Andy Roddick 6-3, 6-2, finishing with a run of 20 consecutive points against the off-form American.
The decisive 20-18 tiebreaker in the Federer-Safin match equalled an open-era record. Borg finished a 1973 Wimbledon match with a 20-18 tiebreaker over Premjit Lall of India, while Goran Ivanisevic ended a 1993 U.S. Open win over Daniel Nestor of Toronto in a tiebreaker with the same score.
After top-seeded Nestor and Mark Knowles of the Bahamas were 3-0 in the round-robin phase of the Masters Cup doubles, they were beaten 6-2, 6-4 by American twins Bob and Mike Bryan in the semi-finals on Friday..
Nestor and Knowles still finish the year as the No. 1 team, after winning five titles, including the U.S Open and Masters Series events in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Madrid.
They also end 2004 sharing the No. 1 spot in the ATP's individual doubles rankings. Jonas Bjorkman of Sweden could have overtaken them, but he and partner Todd Woodbridge of Australia also lost in the semi-finals.
Nestor joins Grant Connell of Vancouver (1993) as the only Canadian to finish No. 1 in the ATP doubles rankings.
For Federer, a close second to Roddick a year ago, 2004 marks his first year-end No. 1 on the ATP singles computer rankings.
While his playing skills are widely praised and admired, Federer's character also comes in for rave reviews. When Spaniard Carlos Moya, 28, was asked last week whether playing against Federer, 23, was as intimidating as taking on the likes of Pete Sampras and others, he said: "He is much younger than me. He talks to all the players and he's a very nice guy. I'm not saying the others are not nice, but they are different -- they go, do their own thing and that's it. Roger is a guy that you can talk to. He says hi every day. So that makes him not as intimidating as the other guys."
The Swiss player, who stopped off at the United Nations in New York on his way to Houston to help launch the UN International Year of Sport and Physical Education, is a great ambassador for tennis. He met UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan in New York and had lunch with former U.S. president George Bush in Houston last week.
On Saturday, the amazing tiebreaker with Safin included a point when the computer-generated line-calling Shot Spot showed a ball on match point for him at 12-11 had been good, although it was ruled out. Federer later discussed the idea of using new systems for officiating matches.
The matter is a more complicated than it might appear because removing linespeople could render the sport antiseptic and impersonal. Also, having to go to computer-generated video replay might lead to abuses in terms of time-consuming appeals and interruptions.
Federer revealed himself as a traditionalist on the subject. "The way it is now," he said, "it stays a very natural game, tennis. There are linespeople and umpires involved. If there were robots sitting around the court, I wouldn't feel great about it.
"So I'd rather have a bad call on occasion. . . . We should keep it the way it is."