Weekend Sport

The Tour De France 2007 has kicked off y’day. Ferrari is back to its winning ways. But the day belongs to Roger Federer.

But who won our hearts? Rafa, without doubt. He showed himself to be a complete sportsman, scowling when down and playing like a man possessed at all times. If only, he had a better serve or better luck. The golden cup would have been his for the first time.

Instead it went to the same man for the fifth consecutive time. He was humble in his victory, acknowledging the generous dollop of luck that came his way and also paying tribute to Borg, the man whose record on the very same lawns, he matched today. We also liked the custom made signage on his kit - with four little symbols - a derivative of the Swiss flag and some golden tints matching the rest of his Nike gear. There should be fifth one soon.

We think that Fedex is unnerved whenever he plays Rafa, whatever the surface. Rafa on the other hand just plays. Most of his brilliant shots disappear. He plays mostly defensive spin shots for return of serve. Until the last set, he rarely played the blistering forehand shot that he plays a lot, against lesser opponents. In fact his best play of the match was one ace, served at 129 mph. Rafa simply had no answer to that one, despite being in the right place and perfectly poised. Some psyching up is needed. We recommend Lance Armstrong, the maniac with the incredible VO2 max, among other things.

Maria Sharapova who played Venus, was asked about a similar issue – whether she has problems when she plays one of the Williams sisters, considering her poor record against them. She gave a reply befitting a champion. She said that she has been number 1 before and she has won Grand Slams and hence, stuff such as that should not matter. But if you saw that match, you would agree with me that the Williams sisters should really be playing along with men. They are simply too strong for the women a la Judith Polgar.