The day Roger Federer couldn’t stop laughing at CNN correspondent’s Spanish phrases was the day they found their first match point against Rafael Nadal.
Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal were on different ends of the tennis world, Nadal in the top position and Federer in the bottom one. Both players, Federer as much as Nadal, were in control of their respective rankings, Nadal with the number one spot and Federer in the number two spot.
“Who gives a fuck about rankings?” said the world’s best player, Roger Federer, as he exited the Miami Beach Convention Center in a red Ferrari. Federer is the man they call Roger Federer, the man who has the ability to make you lose your mind at the drop of a tennis ball.
“I am not here to win points,” said Rafael Nadal, “but I do want to win games.” Nadal is the man they call Rafael, the man who has the ability to make you lose your mind at the drop of a tennis ball.
As the two rivals walked to their respective courts, Nadal and Federer had very different reactions, one of them laughing, and the other one being very serious.
“He’s a nice guy,” Nadal said to Federer, as they walked across the court, “but don’t ever do that to me again!”
Federer was serious from the beginning, he wanted to prove he could out-think his fellow competitor.
“I was going for match points because he’s such a nice guy, and I knew I had him mentally all the time. My mind is already made up and I didn’t want him to play a tennis stroke that he could use again. I wanted the match. He said he was going for match points, I said, ‘No, you’re going for an impossible, impossible point,’ I wanted to prove to myself and to everyone watching that I can beat him every time, because every time he gets in a bad position, he has a chance to win and he doesn’t. “
As the two rivals crossed the net, both teams looked on in silence, but one team was in a hurry and the other one was in a shock of disbelief. Nadal and Federer were just about to begin, a match that couldn’t end any quicker.
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