It's funny to see so many people ripping into Wilander
But people should cut him some slack, even if he is making some wild statements. You have to understand that:
1)he is a media guy. He needs to stay relevant and put some controversial statements out there
2)he is a nostalgic and genuinely believes that he played in a tougher era of tennis, thus feeling the need to put down the current one.
3)he may actually believe what he is saying. I've thought about this "weak era" stuff and I think Mats may be talking about Fed's main rivals at the time(especially off clay in 2006 and 2007), there is no other way to explain his words. Nadal gets put ahead as a rival but he was a non-entity outside of natural surfaces until 2008(at least at the GS's), when he reached his first AO and USO SF. Fed's main competition in the 2004-2007(widely considered prime) and even before that were basically guys like safin,roddick,hewitt and let's put davydenko since he is from that generation.
Safin was great(2 GS, 5 MS) but since his 2006 injuries he was never the same player. He ended up with a 10-2 h2h. He lost to Roger multiple times on all surfaces outside of carpet. His last win over Roger was in AO 2005. So he was a good quality rival but only before 2006 IMO.
Andy had a couple of good years and he remained a solid top 10 player till today but he was and remains Fed's pigeon. Even more embarrassing when you consider that they met on HC/grass most of the time. He beat Fed 2 times in 22 matches, his last win coming in 2008 in Miami in three sets. A good fighter, moreso than safin, but without safin's quality IMO. He was unlucky in his career, I've lost count of how many times Roger ousted him from QF or SF stage in GS's, not to mention beating him in all those WB finals. Rival only by name IMO. He was there to meet Roger but he did not have the game to beat him.
Hewitt also had his share of injuries and played his best tennis IMO before 2006. He holds a somewhat respectable 8-17 h2h but most of these wins came before Fed had won his first GS. He win in Halle 2010 was his first win over Fed since 2003 even though they met like 14 more times, usually on lleyton's fav surfaces. A rival does not get double bageled in a GS final IMO.
It's also interesting to see that many of these rivals(safin,hewitt,roddick), even though they were great on HC couldn't cut in big events, not in Roger's prime, well not for the full duration of it anyway.
Safin barely made finals after 2005(in any event). Hewitt basically has the same story, though he did snatch some minor titles in 2006 and 2007. Roddick is a different story, he actually does win 250 and 500 events quite regularly and even won a masters this year but almost always goes down to Fed in majors.
It's interesting to see GS performance outside of clay(weakest surface for both roger and his rivals) for these guys in fed's prime:
2004 AO: Fed beat Hewitt in QF and Marat in F. Roddick went down in QF to Safin. 2-0 to Fed so far.
2004 WB: Fed beat Hewitt in QF and Roddick in F, Marat went down in 1R to Tursunov. 4-0 for Fed.
2004 USO: Fed beat Hewitt in F, Roddick went down in QF(to jochansson) and Safin in Enqvist in 1 R. 5-0 to Roger.
Looking good so far, these guys are losing, but they are meeting Fed in later stages of GS events, 5 meetings overall(hewitt three times,roddick once, marat once).
2005 AO: Safin beat Fed in SF and Hewitt in F, while Hewitt beat Roddick in QF. 5-1 to Fed.
2005 WB: Safin loses in 3R to lopez, Fed beats hewitt in SF and Roddick in F. 7-1 to Fed.
2005 USO: Roddick loses in 1R to Muller, Safin DNE and Hewitt loses to Fed in SF. 8-1.
In 2005 the rivalry with these three is still pretty strong, they meet Fed 4 times overall(hewitt two times,roddick once,safin once).
2006 AO: Safin DNE, Hewitt exits in 2R to Chela,Roddick exits to baggie in 4R and Fed wins it. Still 8-1 for Fed.
2006 WB: Safin loses in 2R(gonzalez), Hewitt loses in QF to Baggie, and Roddick loses to Murray in 3R. Fed wins the event. Still 8-1 for Fed.
2006 USO: Roddick beat Hewitt in QF, Safin loses to Rochus in 3R, Fed wins in F over Roddick. 9-1 to Fed.
So for 2006 we have just one meeting between Fed and rivals, and Roddick takes that spot. Rivalry is on shaky ground
2007 AO: Roddick beat Safin in 3R, Hewitt lost to Gonzalez in 3R, and Fed beat Roddick in SF. 10-1 for Roger.
2007 WB: Fed beats Safin in 3R, Roddick loses in QF to Gasquet, and Hewitt loses in 4R to Djoker. 11-1 for Roger.
2007 USO: Hewitt loses in 2R(calleri), Safin loses in 2R(wawrinka) and Roddick loses to Fed in QF. 12-1 for Roger.
At the end of 2007, the rivalries is pretty much over(three meetings, two roddick, one safin) and Roddick is the only rival remaining for Fed off clay from the good old days.
Since 2006, Safin and Hewitt struggle to get to QF round in GS events while Fed is making GS finals regularly(4 in 2006, 4 in 2007). Oddly, Roddick, the best match-up for Fed, is still at it and meets him more often than not later on(even though he loses).
And this general rule 2006-2007 letdown rule applies to safin and hewitt in smaller events as well(in fed's prime of course). Hewitt meets Roger only two times in non GS events in 2006-2007. Safin has 0 meetings in non GS matches with Fed in 2006-2007. Meanwhile in 2006-2007, Roddick meets Roger two times in non-GS events, but each time being at the TMC, indicating that Roddick had a higher level of play those years that hewitt and safin.
Looking at the overall stats, I would say that rivalries pan out like this in Roger's prime: In 2004-2005, Roger had to deal with Safin and Hewitt in non clay GS events(but usually handled both of them), with Roddick tagging along. In 2006-2007, only Roddick remained, with the addition of Rafa Nadal, who was just starting to get good on grass.
