While his contemporaries were shooting up the rankings and winning Grand Slam titles, he struggled to break through.
“I don’t want to say I was frustrated, but I didn’t understand why it wasn’t happening for me,” Federer said last year. “I was far enough behind that I was, ‘OK, let’s push myself a little more’.”
A month after his Paris flop, that change of attitude reaped immediate dividends as Federer produced a majestic display over the Wimbledon fortnight, defeating Mark Philippoussis in straight sets in the final. The Federer era had begun in earnest and he dominated tennis over the next four years winning 10 Grand Slam titles. On two occasions — in 2004 and 2007 — he won three out of four.
By that time Spanish claycourt king Rafael Nadal had come along to become the player Federer has always seen as his greatest rival.
Nadal ruled at Roland Garros and it took his shock defeat at the hands of Robin Soderling in 2009 to clear the way for Federer to finally win the French Open, thus completing the Grand Slam set.
By that time he had won Olympic gold with Wawrinka in 2008 and by Wimbledon 2012 he had taken his haul of Grand Slam titles to an all-time best of 17.
