Bjorn Borg could not make it to Roland Garros on Sunday, which turned out to be a missed opportunity. It would have made for just the right photograph: Borg handing over the Coupe des Mousquetaires to his successor in the soft evening light in Paris.
It has been 30 years since Borg won his sixth and last French Open, and it was possible to imagine then that no other relentless baseliner would be able to match Borg's domination at the world's greatest clay-court tournament.
In fact, the man who would manage it had not yet been born. But Rafael Nadal is in the prime of life now, and on Sunday, he reeled in Borg and won his sixth title here by holding off his customary French Open foil: Roger Federer.
An honour
“It's an honour to say that I won as many French Opens as Borg,” Nadal said after his 7-5, 7-6(3), 5-7, 6-1 victory. “It's extraordinary. There is a lot of emotion, but the real satisfaction comes from all the work you do before you get there. There were difficult moments and some very good moments.”
There were tougher moments than usual this year as Nadal was pushed to five sets for the first time at the French Open in the first round against John Isner of the United States and struggled with his timing, depth and confidence into the second week.
“This one was the most difficult of all of them,” said Nadal's uncle and coach Toni Nadal. “Rafa was more nervous. He couldn't manage to really hit the ball well and that gives you a real sense of insecurity.”
But Federer has been quite a French Open security blanket for Nadal. Their rivalry is one of the greatest in tennis history, yet it has been decidedly short on suspense here.
Nadal is now 5-0 against Federer at Roland Garros. Four of those victories have come in finals, and though this match was a thriller in comparison with Nadal's 6-1, 6-3, 6-0 victory in 2008, it still ended with Nadal's imposing his topspin forehand and Federer slumping toward the trophy ceremony with most of the crowd commiserating.
They do love the French-speaking Federer in Paris, the only Grand Slam city where he has been an underdog during his glory years. But though the chants of “Ro-ger, Ro-ger” helped him scale revivalist heights on Friday in his magnificent ambush of Novak Djokovic, they were not enough to lift the 29-year-old Federer past the 25-year-old Nadal, who had a solid, vocal minority chanting “Ra-fa” his way, too.
Federer had his chances, none more significant than the set point he failed to convert with Nadal serving at 2-5 in the first set.
Taking the opening set from Nadal in his year of living dangerously at Roland Garros might have caused more doubts to surface. But Federer's backhand drop shot a stroke he would use often and effectively throughout the match landed just wide this time.
Nadal held serve, then broke Federer in the next game and gathered momentum.
“That's how it goes. Rafa is tough,” Federer said. “I definitely thought I got maybe a touch unlucky there and he got a touch lucky.”
Nadal then shrugged off a false step late in the second set. Serving for a two-set lead at 5-4, 40-30, heavy rain began to fall. Federer saved a set point to deuce, but the players were then forced to leave the court as the rain intensified.
When they returned little more than 10 minutes later, Federer saved another set point and broke Nadal for 5-5.
Though it felt like foreshadowing, it proved nothing more than a brief respite for Federer, who played a mediocre tiebreaker, pressing and making errors in bunches.
“Obviously I'm the one who's playing with smaller margins, so obviously I'm always going to go through a bit more ups and downs,” Federer said.
“Whereas Rafa is content doing the one thing the entire time. So it's always me who's going to dictate play and decide how the outcome is going to be. If I play well, I will most likely win in the score or beat him. If I'm not playing so well, that's when he wins.”
Fluctuating fortunes
Nadal is certainly capable of dictating terms, but Federer's quality of play fluctuated dramatically on Sunday. He would rise up for one more meaningful surge in the third set, rallying from a 2-4 deficit.
But the match turned again in the opening game of the fourth set when Nadal escaped from a 0-40 deficit on his serve. He later broke Federer at love to go up 3-1.
The rest felt like a processional, and when the match ended with a forehand error, Nadal dropped to his knees and cradled his head in his hands before jogging forward to offer his hand and condolences to Federer once more.
A thank you would have been appropriate, too. Nadal held on to his No. 1 ranking only because of Federer's victory over Djokovic in the semifinals. Even if the duopoly of Federer and Nadal appears to be over for good, they managed to restore order in Paris this year, and it would be no surprise to see them playing in the Wimbledon final in four weeks.
Nadal leads their series, 17-8, and has won their last four matches in Grand Slam tournaments. The last time they played in a major event in the 2009 Australian Open final Federer broke down in tears at the awards ceremony after his five-set defeat, muttering “God, it's killing me.”
This loss did not look nearly so traumatic. Federer is ranked No. 3 now, but he proved here that, when in form and inspired, he remains a member of the ruling class, even with his 30th birthday looming.
“It's too bad I couldn't win, but I'm very proud of my run here the last two weeks,” he said in his postmatch remarks to the crowd.
“For me, too, it was a great tournament.”
Federer remains the leader in Grand Slam singles titles with 16, but Nadal now has 10. At 25, he is the second-youngest man to hit that number.
The youngest was Borg, who was 24 when he won his 10th at Wimbledon in 1980. Both Nadal and Borg, who won his titles in Paris between 1974 and 1981, were at their most dominant at Roland Garros.
Nadal and Borg lost to just one man here: Borg to the Italian Adriano Panatta (twice); Nadal to the Swedish slugger Robin Soderling in the fourth round in 2009.
Common features
But Borg and Nadal have more in common than such numbers. They were both long-haired teen idols who maintained career-long connections to their early coaches (Borg had Lennart Bergelin, Nadal has his uncle Toni).
They each redefined the forehand with their technique and topspin. They were the best movers on clay of their generations and possessed fine two-handed backhands, underrated touch, superb endurance and an ability to block out the distractions and momentum shifts and focus, again and again, on the challenge at hand.
Perhaps Borg will make it to Roland Garros when Nadal breaks their tie.
Watching Nadal win in Paris even in an off year, it is hard to imagine him not getting to seven. © New York Times News Service, 2011
