It didn’t decide who is the best ever, or even who is the best in the world right now. Relive the three Wimbledon finals the all-time greats have contested Federer still floats into that fluid forehand with the long extension, serves with perfect precision, and plays with invention.

But another swerve was in store.

This is the official Wimbledon YouTube page. Federer was hitting about twice as many winners as Nadal, following his aggressive game plan, but Nadal was an unbreakable force; he came away with the match’s first break.Then something unfamiliar happened: Federer fell apart. Tournament This is the official Wimbledon YouTube page. Nadal rebounded in the third, but Federer took early control in the fourth, breaking Nadal at 2-1 and 4-1 and eventually winning the Championships when serving at 5-3.Nadal, playing for the seventh consecutive day after rain wreaked havoc on the tournament schedule, showed his mental and physical toughness by pushing the four-time defending champion Federer to five sets for the first time in his 34-match win streak at the All England Club.An attacking Federer made many forays to the net but Nadal had his blistering passes dialed in. After a 30-minute delay, the final resumed and as darkness set in, Nadal finally converted his fourth break point opportunity for an 8-7 lead after Federer hit a forehand long.Another championship point went begging, but at the fourth time of asking Nadal clinched the 6-4, 6-4, 6-7(5), 6-7(8), 9-7 victory in four hours and 48 minutes. Scores Was it revenge for 2008?

But, like all the matches between these two men, it offered a chance to watch two players who have made each other, improbably, almost impossibly, improve, in order to keep pace with the other.

When there were errors, they were of the smallest margins—lines missed by millimetres, ground strokes rolling off the tape.Federer came away with the first set, and the match seemed on its way to becoming another classic.

(That title belongs to the man whom Federer will play in the final, on Sunday, Djokovic.) 2 Nadal, however, fought back to silence the Centre Court crowd and take a two sets to zero lead. In the days leading up to Friday’s match, there was a great deal of talk about that match in 2008—the replays of old points on TV seemed, at times, to overwhelm the coverage of tennis that was actually happening in the present. Year The Championships 2019 will run from 1 July - 14 July. On Friday, they even shared in the ebbs and flows of the match.However high the level was for stretches of the match, it wasn’t a classic—not quite, no matter how much we may have wanted or expected it to be. Not really. The errors came fast, and Nadal started toying with him.

The pressure, at this point, is off, or should be.

Federer took the third set, 6–3. Welcome to Wimbledon on YouTube, your destination for everything that happens at The All England Lawn Tennis Club (Championships). Nadal, leading by two sets to zero, held on to knock Federer off his SW19 throne and celebrate his first Ahead of their Friday semi-final, ATPTour.com remembers their three FedEx ATP Head2Head Federer, who captured his 39th career title and eighth Grand Slam crown, became the sixth man to secure four straight Federer, who clubbed 65 winners – including 24 aces and a plethora of crosscourt backhand winners – equaled For the third year in a row, here they were, defending champion Federer and reigning Their semifinal was one more data point in their long rivalry, not a definitive showdown.