Federer calls modern game "More one dimensional"

First topic message reminder :

These days, the topic of playing surfaces becoming similar keeps coming about in discussions as the top 4 men continue to dominate tennis irrespective of the surface. With the dominance of hard courts, which have been slowed down, tennis has become a battle of long baseline rallies. And those players who can win on hardcourts, also win on clay and grass courts. Roger Federer thinks that this should change and said that there should be some variety in the playing surfaces speed and conditions.

"I think there are no necessarily grass-court players, indoor specialists, not really clay-court specialists, for that matter. So everybody can play everywhere now. In the past people would miss entire clay- or grass-court seasons because they just thought, I’m not going to waste my time there. I’m going to practice and return on a surface that I prefer. It makes it sometimes easier then to dominate through different surfaces. But at the same time, if you’re on bad run, also that run can last longer as well.”

“That you come into, let’s say a quick hard court or a slow clay court and you have somebody who feels totally out of sorts, Before I thought that was pretty funny sometimes to see a guy feeling so uncomfortable having to play the other expert, but trying with what he had to make the other player feel uncomfortable. It’s not so much that anymore now, because everybody hits a good forehand, everybody hits a good backhand, everybody serves well now and moves well and is fit. It’s more one-dimensional now.”

But according to socal nothing has changed since 2003.

http://www.tennisworldusa.org/Roger-Federer-says-all-players-can-play-on-all-surfaces-now-articolo9858.html

2000-04 era journos tended to get it wrong.
There were plenty of "future of tennis" candidates
Safin
Hewitt
Ferrero
Roddick
Ancic
Nalby

Haha - so 2000-2004 was also a weak era for tennis journalists! You couldn't make this up!
I'll leave you to it kr - but you're dead wrong about Hewitt.

Ferrer at his best, in any era, would never be a serious challenger for slams. Hewitt at his best was, and would be.

Would you suppose they got it right then? Between them the future won six Slams!!

I do love the inconsistencies here. We are quoted what current pros think and are told to take it as gospel - fair enough. However, when ex-pros and pundits ?(many of whom were ex-pros) call this a golden era we are told they are ill-informed.

Hewitts best lasted six-eight slams. He made a few finals after that but was never in with a shout in any of them.

Its remarkable that Hewitt once gained seven kilograms in a bid to get fitter and grind his opponents down.

He failed at that and now Im asked to believe he could consistently win slams in this era?

To be fair kingraf, Hewitt was a fantastic player at his best, unfortunately beset by injuries. Parallels to Haas, actually.

As for Federer, I'm glad that he's generated an articulated and thoughtful response to a question that was posed to him. At least it's being discussed a bit more at the moment. He's in the unique position of being both a player who bridges 'eras' and the player who has enormous variety in his game compared to his peers. I'd say that he's better positioned than anyone else in the game to comment on this. What's interesting is that Novak and Andy have both commented previously on the lack of net play and so forth, putting them in roundabout agreement with Federer, yet a few people still reckon they're wrong.

Yes Silver but read the message again and it is sending out mixed messages. He calls players today 'more one dimensional' but also confesses that everybody hits a good serve, a good forehand, a good backhand nowadays (unlike yesteryear does he mean?).

The big difference CC- is that this golden era was beating the "Future" era when they were at their physical peaks.

The top four has been the same, basically for five years. The "future brigade" couldnt get it right simultaneously past 2003. If you think that puts them as equals with the current crop, that is your right, which I wont deny you.

Hmm, that is true CC. Maybe he means that the tour itself as a whole is more one-dimensional, rather than the players themselves? So the players have a sharper skillset overall (debatable, I know) but the lack of variety in playstyles is what he's commenting on.

The comment on the lack of surface specialists stands in stark contrast to Courier's assessment of Federer himself at his peak - that he was a player for all surfaces, and nobody else was. Now, everyone's like that, but is it due to a superior set of tools, or the fact that you no longer need to use as many tools to succeed? Or even both? It's an interesting thing to think about.

One thing that we're all in agreement on is the need for more surface diversity on tour. Perhaps that would help solve this little conundrum.

kingraf wrote:The big difference CC- is that this golden era was beating the "Future" era when they were at their physical peaks.

The top four has been the same, basically for five years. The "future brigade" couldnt get it right simultaneously past 2003. If you think that puts them as equals with the current crop, that is your right, which I wont deny you.

People know my opinions on this. Personally, I place this period of tennis above the early 2000's but it really is pointless trying to judge eras as there are so many variables. As for Fed's comments it seems more to me that he is calling it one-dimensional because the players are good at all aspects of the game as well as surfaces. However, Fed does remark of how players sometimes used to just be competitive on their own surfaces (when there was a difference between them) but he doesn't say he enjoyed that it was more of an observation.

kr I think you're mistaking the overall 'rating' of a player with the peak 'rating' of a player. This is actually a common theme amongst posters.
No-one is saying Hewitt or Safin, with 2 slams, will go down in history as a greater, or equal player, than Djoko or Becker. But that is primarily down to longevity/consistency (for various reasons). At their peak, albeit more short-lived, they were the best in the world and would match up with anyone's peak.
Can the same be said of Ferrer - no way! The guy's never been in a slam final or been in the top 3 - yet you have him down as being Hewitt's equal. Well, that is your right, which I won't deny you.

But by that theory, every slam winner in history is equal.

"At their peak, albeit more
short-lived, they were the best in the
world and would match up with
anyone's peak."

Take Andy Roddick's sole USO victory, that version of Roddick, by his own admission would lose to the 2008-09 version. In the same way Juan Carlos Ferrero's peak does not stand up to Nadals peak Roland Garros win (2008 & 2010).

Winning a slam doesnt mean your best is equal with the best any more than Carl Lewis winning an Olympic medal means he is as fast as Usain Bolt. Safin may have a case, but I dont buy the Hewitt matter.

You're completely over-looking the natural advances in tennis - strings, fitness, rackets, not to mention the fact that when the bar is raised, the other players respond and are 'pulled higher' to try and match/beat it.

And I'm not saying every slam winner is equal - since I clearly said that wasn't the case!

But what it took for Hewitt to win a slam, relative to the tennis of that period, is similar to what it takes now, relative to the tennis of this period. Something Ferrer has never even been close to acheiving.

I'd certainly put Hewitt above Ferrer. Both similar type players but Hewitt more versatile with more weapons in my opinion - oh and more slam wins.

by saying "anyones peak" (anyone being the key) without an indication that you have a timeline, I had to assume you meant in history.

Interesting point you make about the bar being raised. I had a disagreement with an old Springbok rugby player at a media day the other day. The cause of the argument was because I had told him That most Super Rugby teams would beat The Springbok side of the 70s. He disagreed and I asked him:
Is the game faster? He replied yes
Are the players bigger? Yes
Are they more skillful? yes
So they would beat you? And he replied by saying no we were the best the country had to offer, we played the British Lions, how can you say we would lose to the Cheetahs?! The answer is simple really, the bar keeps getting raised, to the point that you have to be special just to get a look-in in morden sports. Carl Lewis would have had to settle for 6-7th in the 2012 Olympics. Being special, precocious isnt really enough. I think it was Michael Atherton the English cricketer who said in his biography that its funny how in every sport where the result is measurable (i.e swimming, running, weightlifting), the perfomances get better, and yet in the sports where the comparisons are merely aesthetic, the perfomances apparetly remain static, or even regress.

Of course they arent, they are going forwards. Is technology helping? Yes, but its not like Hewitt was playing with wooden racquets. For comparison, I took the fifth placed sprinter in the 2012 Olympics' time with the 2000 Olympics winners time
2000 winner- Maurice Greene 9.87s
2012 fifth place- Ryan Bailey 9.88s

Is it really that far fetched to put a guy currently ranked fifth with a former number 1?

Well, if you're saying, for example, that if Fred Perry were to time-travel forward and play Denis Istomen, then Perry would get thrashed, then yes, Istomen is better than Perry.
Hewitt was a big victim of changing racket/string technology and the way it affected the game, plus injuries and illnesses.
But you'd be hard-pressed to find many people who rate Ferrer as high as 2-time slam winner and World No. 1 for 80 weeks Hewitt

Again theres a two-year gap between the two, whatever technology which hurt Hewitt, Ferrer also had to endure. injuries and illnesses were unfortunate, but thats the way it is.

No, because Heiwtt, at an early age, developed a game designed to beat the best in the world at the time i.e. S & V'ers with older racket technology. Ferrer didn't, he was a journeyman, who has acheived a lot less than Hewitt,

kingraf wrote:For comparison, I took the fifth placed sprinter in the 2012 Olympics' time with the 2000 Olympics winners time
2000 winner- Maurice Greene 9.87s
2012 fifth place- Ryan Bailey 9.88s

Is it really that far fetched to put a guy currently ranked fifth with a former number 1?

But that is not what people normally mean when they are comparing who is "better". Paavo Nurmi's personal best over 1,500m was 3:52.6. Kernal Koyuncu failed to advance to the 2012 European Championship 1,500m final with time of 3:48.01. Yet Paavo would be considered in the conversation among the best all time runners while Kernal would not be anywhere near (and that is an understatement).

You seem to be talking about something rather different. You may still be wrong (), but even before then, I would say the angle from which you are looking at it is not something of much interest in the first place.

summerblues wrote:

kingraf wrote:For comparison, I took the fifth placed sprinter in the 2012 Olympics' time with the 2000 Olympics winners time
2000 winner- Maurice Greene 9.87s
2012 fifth place- Ryan Bailey 9.88s

Is it really that far fetched to put a guy currently ranked fifth with a former number 1?

But that is not what people normally mean when they are comparing who is "better". Paavo Nurmi's personal best over 1,500m was 3:52.6. Kernal Koyuncu failed to advance to the 2012 European Championship 1,500m final with time of 3:48.01. Yet Paavo would be considered in the conversation among the best all time runners while Kernal would not be anywhere near (and that is an understatement).

This is precisely why comparing Laver's 11 recognised slams to Nadal's 11 slams is fraught with challenges (or Roy Emerson's 12 as well as this one - Emerson had 10 straight victories in Grand Slam tournament finals (the last ten in which he participated), which remains an all-time record. ). Numbers mean very little in isolation. (Think about Davydenko v Nadal h2h compared to Nadal v Djokovic h2h). The 2000 v 2012 numbers (Greene v Bailey) completely ignore the environment in which they were achieved.

In Nuurmi's case, if we consider it a progression, his numbers were at the top when he was running, but Kernal's are not good enough for qualification due to the progression and the envelope being pushed further out.

@KR... Can I ask your opinion about this one - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_jump_world_record_progression ?

These debates about golden/strong/weak/<SomeName> eras are very tedious in any sport. If the same mindset was applied to the link I have posted, the specific endeavour would make it a weak era, correct? I am pretty certain athletic events are held every year, like Tennis slams.

BTW, Ralph Boston is a relative unknown in this field, for which there is no explanation that I can find?

kingraf wrote:The big difference CC- is that this golden era was beating the "Future" era when they were at their physical peaks.

The top four has been the same, basically for five years. The "future brigade" couldnt get it right simultaneously past 2003. If you think that puts them as equals with the current crop, that is your right, which I wont deny you.

Thats the same with almost every era.

Hewitt,Safin,Roddick, Federer all held better h2h against 90's King Sampras
Sampras,Agassi, Courier,Brugera all hold better h2h against 80's kings
Lendll,Wilander etc,.. held better h2h vs 70's king Connors.

So its not the first time it happens, what interesting all the champs of the respective era dominated a decade and still were capable of winning slams in late 20's and early 30's against young pretenders to the throne.

I am not sure Djoko,Nadal nor Murray will step up and continue this success in 30's i.e in 5 years time even against these fragile upcoming young generation. When Djoko, Murray win slams in 30's lets talk about this being golden era but you yourself will acknowledge they are not that good enough to win on 30's but of course only time will tell the answer.

I find it amusing that people claim in Hewitt or roddick's peak they were just as good as the stars of today. This claim is nonsensical. If you take the best year of roddick's or hewitt's when they were at their best it is incomparable to nadal 2010, djoko 2011 or federer 04-07. Hewitt in his best year won two masters and one slam. Prior to the rise of roger prior to his injuries Hewitt and roddick's best years each are incomparable. So it isn't just in longevity and consistency that they fail in comparison to the stars that came before and the players of today. Why not take this argument and say that Lukas rosol at his peak was as good as federer. Hell I have on occasion hit some pro level shots at my club, why not argue that at my absolute best ie that great backhand pass I hit, that my peak is equal to federer. This argument that Julius repeats makes no sense greatness in any sport is analyzed by your ability to repeat remarkable performances. Trying to separate consistency from greatness or longevity from greatness is like trying to take the ground beef out of your hamburger. This peak greatness argument as Kingraf has pointed makes no sense. Look at Hewitt in 2001 and 2002 when he was at his peak, there was no FedEx, and no injury issues. Even with this most favorable a generous accounting Hewitt, roddick, Safin, and ferrero are massively behind both their predecessors and their immediate successors.

You see this is the invariable that I speak of socal. You point to longevity and consistency as a hallmark of greatness (I agree by the way) but you won't get agreement from all as others put stock in other traits first and foremost. Like the old chestnut that people feel that the early 2000's were better as there were more slam winners/challengers but others will argue that was because there was no real dominant force then and point out that as soon as today's players began to emerge they quickly rose through the rankings to the top past players of the early 2000's and stayed there. There is a case that the fact that today's players are so dominant that it shows how great they are but other detractors will argue that this is because their nearest opposition aren't up to much.

Heck I have even pointed out how you could take two view points on Roger's view point in the original post. Where lydian cherry picks Roger's view that players now are generally one dimensional is that a slight or is it Roger's terminology because he points out that everyone nowadays has a good serve, good forehand and good backhand (unlike yesteryear?).

CaledonianCraig wrote:Where lydian cherry picks Roger's view that players now are generally one dimensional is that a slight or is it Roger's terminology because he points out that everyone nowadays has a good serve, good forehand and good backhand (unlike yesteryear?).

No. If you read my OP it is straight reporting of Federer's comment. I'm not aware of more relevant commentary in the interview. But the use of "one dimensional" is hard to take as a positive given his comments earlier in the year bemoaning lack of variety. I would therefore posit that placing positive spin on his opinion is much more cherry picking of outcome than the OP.

This doesn't have to be an era debate between players...it's more a debate between conditions. Players become products of their environment...Federer, given past context, is saying today's conditions are breeding a style of play that's highly effective but much more limited in its scope of variety and imagination. Who is better placed to make this judgement than him?

At US Open 2011, an interviewer put questions about conditions slowing there to Federer and Fish....i.e, to support the view that things have changed since 2003.

Question: Serve and volley is an important part of the game. Do you feel that's a feature that's coming back into the men's game a bit more, especially on hard courts?

MARDY FISH: I don't think it's coming back in. I don't see much of it from anyone. They've even slowed down this surface, which is frustrating, because this is one of the - this was definitely the fastest slam surface wise that we had. Now with it being, you know, much slower out here this year, it's sort of fit right in with Australia. There's really not - there is a lot of really slow Grand Slams now surface wise. Cincinnati and Montreal were extremely fast; Montreal was an extremely fast surface. I would prefer to play on that surface every single tournament, but it's not how it works out here. So, you know, that type of court can warrant some serving and volleying and coming forward. You can't serve and volley all the time. Guys return too good, so you've got to keep them off balance and off guard. I will certainly come to the net here, I have to, but maybe a little bit less than there.

Question: Who would it favor, the slowness of the surface, out of all the top guys?

MARDY FISH: I think it will favor Djokovic quite a bit. I think it will play a lot like Australia, to be honest. I think at night it will play much slower than during the day. You know, days when it's pretty humid it will play much slower. You know, but Rafa likes those conditions, as well...

ROGER FEDERER: Seems a bit slower, the surface, actually, I thought really when I was playing now. But I don't want to say it's a slight adjustment, because it's not a crazy difference to previous years, but it is slower. That's my opinion. So that has maybe an impact rather than who you play and how you play them.

That last bit in italics is revealing. He's saying the conditions have more relevance than who or how he plays people...because he knows he has to play people the same way in prevailing conditions, ie. take a more one dimensional approach.

But lydian you could argue into that he also indicates one dimensional players in yesteryear. He clearly says that years ago there were players that were competitive on their preferred surfaces but virtually absent elsewhere so that is surely one dimensional of another kind lest we forget the variety of surfaces Rod Laver completed his golden slam on in a variety of surfaces and speeds.

He's talking about the tour as a whole rather than specific players. The tour as a whole requires less variety from its top players across the year to win.

lydian wrote:At US Open 2011, an interviewer put questions about conditions there to Federer and Fish.

Question: Serve and volley is an important part of the game. Do you feel that's a feature that's coming back into the men's game a bit more, especially on hard courts?

MARDY FISH: I don't think it's coming back in. I don't see much of it from anyone. They've even slowed down this surface, which is frustrating, because this is one of the - this was definitely the fastest slam surface wise that we had. Now with it being, you know, much slower out here this year, it's sort of fit right in with Australia. There's really not - there is a lot of really slow Grand Slams now surface wise. Cincinnati and Montreal were extremely fast; Montreal was an extremely fast surface. I would prefer to play on that surface every single tournament, but it's not how it works out here. So, you know, that type of court can warrant some serving and volleying and coming forward. You can't serve and volley all the time. Guys return too good, so you've got to keep them off balance and off guard. I will certainly come to the net here, I have to, but maybe a little bit less than there.

Question: Who would it favor, the slowness of the surface, out of all the top guys?

MARDY FISH: I think it will favor Djokovic quite a bit. I think it will play a lot like Australia, to be honest. I think at night it will play much slower than during the day. You know, days when it's pretty humid it will play much slower. You know, but Rafa likes those conditions, as well...

ROGER FEDERER: Seems a bit slower, the surface, actually, I thought really when I was playing now. But I don't want to say it's a slight adjustment, because it's not a crazy difference to previous years, but it is slower. That's my opinion. So that has maybe an impact rather than who you play and how you play them.

That last bit in italics is revealing. He's saying the conditions have more relevance than who or how he plays people...because he knows he has to play people the same way in prevailing conditions, ie. take a more one dimensional approach.

Well as I have said on speeds of courts the players just have to get on with them. Okay so Federer muses that slower courts will suit Djokovic but it is certainly fair to say that Federer has had his cake and eaten it to when court speeds suited him. I offer the opinion that what would tennis history books say if courts had been altered around 2000 to be really slow - no Federer dominance per chance? You see it is those variable again.

lydian wrote:He's talking about the tour as a whole rather than specific players. The tour as a whole requires less variety from its top players across the year to win.

But that being the case he surely is saying that players of today are good in all areas wereas he seems to hint that wasn't always the case. He does say players specialised on certain surfaces (which even Fed says he found funny) so surely the fact they couldn't compete on all surfaces made them one dimensional in their own ways.

So why is Federer using the term "more one dimensional NOW" then?

As a reference to court speeds of course. But read his other views and he certainly doesn't make yesteryear sound all rosy either and also one dimensional was a reference to all players being good across the board so you could say that is a little tick for thee here and now as well.

Yes to court speeds which are homogenising and creating less variety. He speaks from the viewpoints of a top player, not a specialist ranked much lower down, battling through draws to win events. What he's saying is that people all play the same way now, the game as a whole is more one dimensional, so he doesn't have to change his game plans anymore so its easier to win across the tour. For all these modern "multidimensional" players who have good FHs and BHs we have the same 4-5 players winning everything...because they can, because its the easiest its ever been for top players to dominate the tour. This simply wasn't possible in yesteryear, it was a much harder challenge to win all 4 slams never mind all 9 Masters.

You are throwing a lot of assumptions in there me thinks lydian. You could say his comments about all players now have good serve, backhand, forehand as a comment that has him saying that wasn't the case in yesteryear (so one up to the here and now). He speaks about how funny it was to see players only specialise on certain surfaces so can we assume he feels those players were one dimensional as well? As for your last line, like I said to socal in an earlier post, your opinion that we only get the same winners due to it being so easy can equally be turned on its head by arguing they do so because they are so great. After all it is a safe assumption that considering that Nadal is widely seen as the greatest clay courter of all-time and Federer widely accepted as the greatest player of all-time.

That's the beauty of debate...opinion. None of us have the definitive answers but we know Federer has bemoaned lack of variety in the modern game for a few years now. This is the classic generalist vs specialist discussion....jack of all trades vs narrower artisan. Yes we have more players today who are 'adept' in all departments but you might argue we have fewer who truly excel in key skill areas as well. Tennis shouldn't be just about FHs and BHs but that's it's become and I feel Federer is essentially reflecting that. Yes we have great players right now but who are we to know what guys like Lendl, Borg and Agassi could have done in these present conditions given their baseline skills before we start throwing "greatest ever" labels around.

As I have said there are too many invariables to judge eras V eras. All we can do is judge each great of the sport on their results in the era they played. They can only beat the players before them and each are playing with the same equipment. However, what true legends of the sport manage to do is dominate - whatever it takes they find a way. That being the case the players like Federer and Nadal have been dominant as Djokovic has been for a shorter spell. Now you would be entitled to argue that is because of homogenised surfaces but players in pre-homogenised surfaces eras were dominant as well such as Borg, Connors, McEnroe and Sampras for a start so why couldn't someone from the early 2000's manage it if they were true legends? Now you can argue that homogenised surfaces now negates variety but if you look at those at the top they are all players with great variety and all the shots in the book that they are allowed to play as part of the surfaces.

socal1976 wrote:I find it amusing that people claim in Hewitt or roddick's peak they were just as good as the stars of today. This claim is nonsensical. If you take the best year of roddick's or hewitt's when they were at their best it is incomparable to nadal 2010, djoko 2011 or federer 04-07. Hewitt in his best year won two masters and one slam. Prior to the rise of roger prior to his injuries Hewitt and roddick's best years each are incomparable. So it isn't just in longevity and consistency that they fail in comparison to the stars that came before and the players of today. Why not take this argument and say that Lukas rosol at his peak was as good as federer. Hell I have on occasion hit some pro level shots at my club, why not argue that at my absolute best ie that great backhand pass I hit, that my peak is equal to federer. This argument that Julius repeats makes no sense greatness in any sport is analyzed by your ability to repeat remarkable performances. Trying to separate consistency from greatness or longevity from greatness is like trying to take the ground beef out of your hamburger. This peak greatness argument as Kingraf has pointed makes no sense. Look at Hewitt in 2001 and 2002 when he was at his peak, there was no FedEx, and no injury issues. Even with this most favorable a generous accounting Hewitt, roddick, Safin, and ferrero are massively behind both their predecessors and their immediate successors.

Actually you're misrepresenting the main thrust of my argument (as if that's never happened before). Kingraf is putting Ferrer on equal status with Hewitt. I'm disagreeing, saying Hewitt was much better.
And, as I have said on more than one occassion, I'm not claiming Hewitt is or should be regarded as as great a player as, say, Edberg, or Djoko. Yet there you go again, twisting the arguments of other posters into something they haven't said, and then arguing against a position that no-one holds - something a lot of posters no doubt find amusing,

Lol...Edward Woodward would (that's a lot of wood) be proud of the size of some of socal's straw men.



Of course I'd rather be thinking of Britt Ekland from that film. Just jesting Socal BTW...

kingraf wrote:by saying "anyones peak" (anyone being the key) without an indication that you have a timeline, I had to assume you meant in history.

Interesting point you make about the bar being raised. I had a disagreement with an old Springbok rugby player at a media day the other day. The cause of the argument was because I had told him That most Super Rugby teams would beat The Springbok side of the 70s. He disagreed and I asked him:
Is the game faster? He replied yes
Are the players bigger? Yes
Are they more skillful? yes
So they would beat you? And he replied by saying no we were the best the country had to offer, we played the British Lions, how can you say we would lose to the Cheetahs?! The answer is simple really, the bar keeps getting raised, to the point that you have to be special just to get a look-in in morden sports. Carl Lewis would have had to settle for 6-7th in the 2012 Olympics. Being special, precocious isnt really enough. I think it was Michael Atherton the English cricketer who said in his biography that its funny how in every sport where the result is measurable (i.e swimming, running, weightlifting), the perfomances get better, and yet in the sports where the comparisons are merely aesthetic, the perfomances apparetly remain static, or even regress.

Of course they arent, they are going forwards. Is technology helping? Yes, but its not like Hewitt was playing with wooden racquets. For comparison, I took the fifth placed sprinter in the 2012 Olympics' time with the 2000 Olympics winners time
2000 winner- Maurice Greene 9.87s
2012 fifth place- Ryan Bailey 9.88s

Is it really that far fetched to put a guy currently ranked fifth with a former number 1?

An absolute cracker of basic logic and reason Kingraf, well this post convinces me that you should not quit your day job since your day job is sports journalism. I agree with this post if you look at all objectively measured sports the times, weights, jumps that players are making are going up and up. But if you talk about sports that don't have those objective types of measures like football, tennis, etc. You always get fans, usually older ones who claim that today's players aren't as good.

I will give a caveat to your post in that while over the long haul the level goes up that the progression can be in fits and starts. Sometimes its a case of one step forward and two steps back. For example, when the previous golden generation of Agassi, Sampras, Becker, Courier, and Edberg began to age we had a retrenchment period in the late 90s and early 2000s. Just as today it is clear that the murray, djoko, nadal generation of players are superior to the Tomic/Dimitrov class when comparing their development at this age. Craig gave the best analogy it is like the stock market over time the level of stock prices always goes up but it doesn't mean that every day, every week, or even ever year the stock market goes up, but in the longterm it always ends higher and higher. Sports development is similar in its trajectory.

Leaving alone the playing styles, purely for surfaces, there used to be five surfaces, viz., Grass, Clay, Carpet, Hard(Cement/Concrete) and Wood.

Now we have three, Grass(Fast/Medium), Clay(Medium/Slow), Hard (Fast/Slow).

Carpet and Wood are gone.

Variety has given way to rivalry. I am certain many posters wanted to see Nadal v Djokovic in Madrid, not Nadal v Wawrinka. The TDs are trying their best to oblige.

Blue Clay almost cost Tiriac his job.

laverfan wrote:I am certain many posters wanted to see Nadal v Djokovic in Madrid, not Nadal v Wawrinka. The TDs are trying their best to oblige.

Exactly. And that is one of the reasons why I think we are unlikely to see surfaces diverge too much in future. Even on tennis boards such as this one, where most members are following many players - not just the top ones - the matches between the top players invariably attract more attention than other matches (in spite of people complaining that we have too many repeats of the same).

This must be even more so for paying public. You only have so many chances to see top players play each other live. Unless you follow the tour traveling from one stop to another, the tour will - at the very best - stop in your area a couple of times a year. It does not matter if Nadal and Nole played in the final the last three or four tournaments, it will still be a rare opportunity to see them play live.

It would be suicidal for a TD to create a very different set of conditions and increase chances of upsets along the way.

summerblues wrote:

laverfan wrote:I am certain many posters wanted to see Nadal v Djokovic in Madrid, not Nadal v Wawrinka. The TDs are trying their best to oblige.

Exactly. And that is one of the reasons why I think we are unlikely to see surfaces diverge too much in future. Even on tennis boards such as this one, where most members are following many players - not just the top ones - the matches between the top players invariably attract more attention than other matches (in spite of people complaining that we have too many repeats of the same).

This must be even more so for paying public. You only have so many chances to see top players play each other live. Unless you follow the tour traveling from one stop to another, the tour will - at the very best - stop in your area a couple of times a year. It does not matter if Nadal and Nole played in the final the last three or four tournaments, it will still be a rare opportunity to see them play live.

It would be suicidal for a TD to create a very different set of conditions and increase chances of upsets along the way.

Great post summer this is why I am happy as hell that the surface specialists have gone away. I find it interesting that the modern game is denounced as one dimensional yet the same critics often bemoan the loss of the surface specialists the ultimate one trick ponies who sell out their technique and game for two months out of the year. I don't want to see Juan Pablo Whoisthat beat the world number one in the second or third round of RG. Variety is all well and good but these homogenized conditions do allow for the best players to be competitive even on their second or third favorite surface and this is a value to the broadcasters and the tournament directors.

Yes, surface slowing has been driven by commercial reasons to ensure the marquee names make it through all the time. I think that discussion has been had before.

Socal, you seem to forget its none other than Federer calling the game one dimensional. He also said in Dubai the game needs more variety. Specialists were products of the environment, just as players are now, when surfaces were much more different it was nigh on impossible for 1 player to be the best across all surfaces, it made tennis the harder challenge to dominate it used to be. Federer bemoans the lack of variety, that is his - and my own thrust throughout all this. For that I constantly get called myopic, nostalgic and a 'putter down' of the modern game. TDs, driven by their wallets, are dictating conditions - creating less variety and more ralleyfests. If you think, unlike Federer and others, that less variety is good for the game then so be it but don't run me down for wanting more variety.

lydian wrote:Yes, surface slowing has been driven by commercial reasons to ensure the marquee names make it through all the time. I think that discussion has been had before.

Socal, you seem to forget its none other than Federer calling the game one dimensional. He also said in Dubai the game needs more variety. Specialists were products of the environment, just as players are now, when surfaces were much more different it was nigh on impossible for 1 player to be the best across all surfaces, it made tennis the harder challenge to dominate it used to be. Federer bemoans the lack of variety, that is his - and my own thrust throughout all this. For that I constantly get called myopic, nostalgic and a 'putter down' of the modern game. TDs, driven by their wallets, are dictating conditions - creating less variety and more ralleyfests. If you think, unlike Federer and others, that less variety is good for the game then so be it but don't run me down for wanting more variety.

I'm not certain that we can take these Fed comments quoted and assume he "bemoans the lack of variety" - it can be taken in two different ways. He'd certainly like more variety - but he could well have the same postion as the likes of Socal, CC and I, i.e. the game is very very good, but needs a bit more variety

You see Lydian, I don't think many are arguing against a few faster courts (it'd certainly put Rafa at a disadvantage :-)) they are 'arguing' at the abject miserable manner that some posters have about the current game

Subtle difference

Federer does bemoan lack of variety and says it often. This during WTF2012...

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“It’s an easy fix. Just make quicker courts, then it’s hard to defend,” Federer said. “Attacking style is more important. It’s only on this type of slow courts that you can defend the way we are all doing right now.”

Federer was the two-time defending champion in London and emphasized that he was happy with this court, calling it one of the faster indoor surfaces on the circuit. He said slower courts are also good for long rallies _ which are a big crowd pleaser _ but that having more variety in the surfaces would force players to learn to be more aggressive.

“What you don’t want is that you hit 15 great shots and at the end, it ends up in an error,” he said. “So I think sometimes quicker courts do help the cause. I think it would help from time to time to move to something a bit faster. That would help to learn, as well, for many different players, different playing styles, to realize that coming to the net is a good thing, it’s not a bad thing.”

Djokovic and Murray also rely heavily on their great defensive abilities, which have helped set them apart from the rest of the pack. Having more tournaments played on faster surfaces could make it easier for other players to challenge the sport’s “Big Four,” Federer said, adding that he wasn’t sure tournament directors would necessarily buy into that. “I think some variety would be nice, some really slow stuff and then some really fast stuff, instead of trying to make everything sort of the same,” he said. “You sort of protect the top guys really by doing that because you have the best possible chance to have them in the semis at this point, I think.”

Djokovic said his strategy against Federer is usually to try and extend the rallies and hope for an opportunity. “He’s somebody that is very aggressive, that likes to finish points very quickly,” Djokovic said. “But I managed to get a lot of shots back into the court, being passive, a couple meters behind the baseline. … That was one of the goals tonight, to always try to get him into the longer rallies where I think I had the better chance.”

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Federer isn't being subtle, nor am I on this topic. I simply want more variety. If its interpreted as being miserable about the modern game then again so be it...you might as well call Federer and other nostalgic dinosaurs the same then.

BTW, I wouldn't be quite so quick to assume Nadal wouldn't thrive in quicker conditions. He plays with a semi western FH, like Federer, so doesn't struggle with low balls or slices and is an accomplished volleyer. He's won Queens - the fastest court on the tour - beating guys like Karlovic along the way.

I am sorry lydian but basically in the above quote all Roger Federer is saying is what posters such as myself, banbro and socal have been saying - get more fast courts in and yes you will get variety. Like I said the other day you should be moaning at the ATP and tournament directors instead of posters on here as A. They are the only ones that can change things. B. Posters on here are all asking for quicker courts as well.

Yes but you don't get called a nostalgia driven moaning myopic for saying it.
Whatever...lets forget it, sorry for bringing it up.

I am not aware you were called that ....OTT in my opinion.

CaledonianCraig wrote:I do love the inconsistencies here. We are quoted what current pros think and are told to take it as gospel - fair enough. However, when ex-pros and pundits ?(many of whom were ex-pros) call this a golden era we are told they are ill-informed.

Yes virtually every pundit talks up the current period as being particularly strong, I never remember the weight of journalistic opinion coming down so strongly in favor of the rollover boys eventhough it is common to fawn over a young slam champion in any era and make him out to be the best thing since sliced bread.

Wait a minute news flash, Federer called London of 2012 one of the quicker courts on tour and he lost in straight sets Djokovic. Funny, people were always telling me after that victory that London isn't a fast court it is a medium speed court and that if it was a fast court Federer would have won.

Perhaps it is one of the quicker courts - being medium speed