2011 French Open

[Westside]

I want Federer to win it. I totally respect Nadal. Nadal is younger and has more opportunities to win Grand Slams, plus, while watching him at Indian Wells two years ago, he has annoying habit that irrates me to no end. I will leave it at that.

I agree with Foobar75, and win on Clay over a prime Nadal will cement Federer as the G.O.A.T tennis player.

 

[Highlander]

Great match so far between Federer and Nadal. Now starting play again after a rain delay. Nadal is playing like a feral beast against Federer's calm, fluid, yet ice-cold marksman's precision. Federer's concentration on the court is like that of a Buddhist monk. The strength of his mind...the ability of him to focus on what he's doing physically, is unmatched.

 

[j41181]

Great match so far between Federer and Nadal.  Now starting play again after a rain delay.  Nadal is playing like a feral beast against Federer's calm, fluid, yet ice-cold marksman's precision.  Federer's concentration on the court is like that of a Buddhist monk.  The strength of his mind...the ability of him to focus on what he's doing physically, is unmatched.

Great match so far, but Nadal clearly has the upper hand. It will take divine intervention for ol' Federer to win this one.

 

[Highlander]

Federer breaks Nadal's serve and wins the 3rd Set, 7-5. Never count out Federer.

 

[j41181]

It was kinda sad to see how the 4th set went (6-1 for Nadal). That's 10 GRAND SLAMS now for the Spanish Sensation. That fact he's only 25 years old, and has reevaluated his tennis schedules to lessen the strain on his tendon and knees, he could catch (or overtake) Federer in the next 3-4 years. He's raised his game to dominate ALL surfaces.

 

[foobar75]

I think we're slowly entering territory now where legit questions can be raised about just who is the better player. If Nadal's dominance over Federer was just limited to clay, that'd be one thing. But as you say, Nadal has raised his game to become a complete player on the grass and hard courts.

We're not there yet, obviously. The 16-10 edge in GS wins gives the edge to Federer, despite his 8-17 record against Nadal. But, if Nadal manages to win Wimbledon and then the US Open just like he did last year, he'll immediately move to top 3 all time in my book, right behind Federer and Sampras.

 

[darthvader]

I too have serious doubts about whether federer is the greatest player of all time. As brilliant as he looked against djokovic he just cannot summon up that extra mojo he needs to beat nadal. If I were to list all the great players such as sampras, borg, mcenroe, lendl, connors and even agassi their win-loss gap against any player in their era was never that big as it is between federer and nadal which right now is borderline embarrassing for federer. Maybe federer needs a consultant whenever he faces nadal. One thing is for sure I think he is too close to nadal on a personal level and maybe needs to reasses that. I think federer doesn't hate him enough. I remember agassi saying in an interview that he could never be friends with sampras because they were both after the same thing.

 

[Don Wassall]

It looked for a long time that Federer would end up being pretty much universally acknowledged as the best ever, but Nadal waylaid that trajectory and now with Federer almost 30 it's Nadal that has an opportunity to win the mostgrand slam eventsof any tennis player. But now here comes Djokovic, entering his peak years and trying to move ahead of Rafa as the clear-cut best player. Nadal won on his best surface, but we'll see how he fares at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open. Should be lots more great tennis to come this year.

 

[GWTJ]

Six of Nadal's ten Slam titles are French Open wins. Not much overall greatness there. I don't believe Nadal should be mentioned anywhere near Federer when talking about the best ever. His winning record against Federer has come either on clay or later in Roger's career as Roger was declining.