It was classic Roger Federer.
He had just come through a seesawing five-setter in his opening match at the last Major of the year, the first time he had been taken to five sets here in Round 1 since he debuted in 2000.
It was the first time at the US Open that he had lost the opening set to a player outside the top 50 since 2007, a fourth-round contest against Feliciano Lopez.
He had come within touching distance of losing in the first round in New York for the first time in 17 visits, and for the first time at any Major since Roland Garros in 2003.
He had entered the match without his usual intensive preparation as he nursed a back injury picked up in Montreal into competitive shape.
Yet almost every element of his compelling 4-6, 6-2, 6-1, 1-6, 6-4 encounter with the 19-year-old #NextGen American, Frances Tiafoe, received the upbeat Federer treatment.
No, he admitted, he did not get the ideal start—“I always knew I was going to come in feeling rusty or not great. I was hoping to start better”—but:
“I always try to keep a very positive mindset out there.”
He elaborated.
“I’m very happy how I’m feeling right now, how I felt coming off the court. I think there’s a lot of positives for me to look at, that I can come through a five-setter with the preparation that I had.
“Look, if I enter the tournament, it’s because I believe I can play and go deep. I still believe that. I think this will actually give me a lot of confidence. In the first set really I was just seeing and feeling it, see how far I could push, but I was never in pain. It was OK.
“That’s why when I was down a set, I just said, OK, the match starts here. One set all, OK, it’s a best-of-three set match. Being in the fifth set, I said, It’s great, I’m still in the match. Things are actually great.”
A less positive mindset may have seen 10 winners alongside 10 forced errors and 18 unforced errors in the first set, and allowed space for some doubts. A less positive mindset may have watched two clean winners whistle past to break him when serving for the match, and become nervous. The Federer take?
“At the end was the drama, the back and forth. It was very exciting. I really enjoyed myself even though maybe I also was tired and nervous at the end. It was very cool to be part of that match.”
And while most onlookers began scratching their heads during the first set at his relatively poor serving, his slew of backhand errors, and his less than nimble footwork, he found only good feedback.
“Honestly, if I would have felt going into this tournament that my back was going to get worse every match, I probably wouldn’t have played. My hope and my belief is that it’s only going to get better from here because every day that goes by puts me further away from what happened in Montreal. So that’s how I see it.”
He is a player, too, who feeds off the energy of a crowd, and invariably a crowd that gives him their wholehearted support. He played a young American with an uninhibited game, an American that was taking the five-time former champion to his limit, yet Federer’s support was at least as raucous as that for Tiafoe.
“I think in many ways, people were hoping for a good battle between the #NextGen and somebody established like myself. In many ways, also it felt like people were happy to see me again after missing last year. I felt like the energy was in the building. They were very excited about seeing me back on the court, especially after the year that I’ve had. They seemed like a really good crowd, with support for both players. It was a lot of fun playing in that atmosphere.”
Federer is 36, and has been playing at the US Open, man and boy, since the mighty Arthur Ashe arena was erected 20 years ago—as he was keen to point out after the match. Yet his zest for this sport and for the challenge of the chase seems undiminished.
“I think the unknown is the exciting bit, to be quite honest.
“Not knowing how you’re going to feel in a fifth set, not knowing how you’re going to be serving for a match at 5-4 in the fifth. Not knowing how it feels to be broken three straight games, but you still have a chance. In these best-of-five-set matches you have a lot of lives.
“It’s more to go through all those emotional rollercoasters early, the rush of getting crowd support, then the feeling like, Oh, I got to produce something so the crowd gets back into it. Feeling that pressure is not fun, but it’s part of what you go through.”
Yes, it was classic Federer: He is only too aware of his pulling power, his popularity and his legacy. And he loves every minute of it.
A by-product of this particular win was officially to regain the No2 ranking just eight months after he played and won the Australian Open ranked No17. Should he win the title here, he would not only extend many of his own records but reclaim the No1 spot.
His first match here did leave a question mark over such an outcome, about whether his back really is robust enough to survive six more best-of-five matches against—possibly— the likes of Nick Kyrgios, Juan Martin del Potro, Dominic Thiem, and Rafael Nadal.
But if there was ever living proof of the power of positive thinking, Federer is your man.