Here is a nice description of that amazing BH Half-volley against Blake in the TMC final, among other things.
Instantly Roger Federer would have noted the flight, assessed velocity, estimated topspin, calculated the ball was going to land almost on the baseline, on the backhand side, and that he lacked enough time to move his feet and arrange his body for an orthodox reply.
Whether in the half-second he had Federer simply reached into his boundless portfolio of shots, whether he searched his imagination and found a creative answer, whether there is an instinctive genius that propels him to do things sometimes even beyond his understanding, we don't know.
What we know is that the shot he then manufactured against James Blake in the Masters Cup final drew oaths and exclamations even from subdued men.
He half-turned and, not entirely balanced, in a sweeping motion, on the half-volley, with his backhand, didn't drive it, but flicked it, like a table tennis shot almost. The shot could work only if it was perfect. It was. Perfect whip of wrist for speed, perfect position of racket for direction, perfect caress for spin, and the ball whirred, rose, dipped and passed a stupefied Blake.
Till that moment, that shot did not exist, it had waited for Federer to come to play it, an act of invention and effrontery beyond the compass of even the very good player.
http://www.hindu.com/2006/12/28/stories/2006122801791900.htm
bg
Instantly Roger Federer would have noted the flight, assessed velocity, estimated topspin, calculated the ball was going to land almost on the baseline, on the backhand side, and that he lacked enough time to move his feet and arrange his body for an orthodox reply.
Whether in the half-second he had Federer simply reached into his boundless portfolio of shots, whether he searched his imagination and found a creative answer, whether there is an instinctive genius that propels him to do things sometimes even beyond his understanding, we don't know.
What we know is that the shot he then manufactured against James Blake in the Masters Cup final drew oaths and exclamations even from subdued men.
He half-turned and, not entirely balanced, in a sweeping motion, on the half-volley, with his backhand, didn't drive it, but flicked it, like a table tennis shot almost. The shot could work only if it was perfect. It was. Perfect whip of wrist for speed, perfect position of racket for direction, perfect caress for spin, and the ball whirred, rose, dipped and passed a stupefied Blake.
Till that moment, that shot did not exist, it had waited for Federer to come to play it, an act of invention and effrontery beyond the compass of even the very good player.
http://www.hindu.com/2006/12/28/stories/2006122801791900.htm
bg
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