Miami (USA) – March 28, 2004 will forever be marked in the history of tennis. Exactly 20 years ago, the first match between Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal took place on the circuit, in a game valid for the third round of the Masters 1000 (still called the Masters Series) in Miami. Then 17 years old and 34th in the rankings, the Spaniard surprised and beat the Swiss with a double 6/3 in just 1h10 of confrontation.
At the time, Federer was 22 years old and was already number 1 in the world, with two Grand Slam titles under his belt. Until that moment, the Swiss had a streak of 23 wins in 24 games played during the season, having won the Australian Open, Dubai and Indian Wells titles.
Nadal, in turn, had his best result of the year as runner-up in Auckland, and, despite beating the big name on the circuit and main favorite for the title, he didn’t make it past the next round, falling in three sets to Chile’s Fernando Gonzalez. Interestingly, Rafa had eliminated Croatian Goran Ivanisevic on his debut, who had a successful time coaching Serbian Novak Djokovic between 2019 and 2024.
Over the following seasons, Federer and Nadal met on a total of 40 occasions, with 16 triumphs for the Swiss and 24 for the Spaniard, who lost only two of the 16 matches played on clay, in the decisions in Hamburg in 2007 and Madrid, two years ago. after. The last duel between them took place in July 2019, in the Wimbledon semifinal, with Roger winning 3 sets to 1.
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See their testimonies after their first duel, in Miami, 20 years ago:
Roger Federer
“I think it’s always difficult to play against someone for the first time. He played a very good game and today he was the best player. He is not a player who hits the ball hard or straight, it is more the effect he gives, what the ball does when it bounces, going very high. That was the fight I had today. I tried to escape it, but I couldn’t. I think the game was always in his favor, he hit incredible balls, but that’s how young people do it (laughs). It doesn’t surprise me, I’ve heard a lot about him and we had already met at a tournament, so I don’t think it’s a big surprise. He is a very peculiar character on the court, different from the others. It depends a lot on his fighting spirit, which reminds me a little of Lleyton [Hewitt]. Everyone seeks that attitude, but not everyone can have that level of success early in their career.”
Rafael Nadal
“I’m very happy, I played one of the best games of my life. Obviously, I know he didn’t play his best tennis and that’s why I managed to win. If he had played at his best, I wouldn’t have had a chance. Today I played almost perfect tennis, I stayed well on the court, dominating the exchanges and putting pressure on him so he couldn’t play his game. But I forgot to highlight one thing: today I served extremely well. I probably haven’t served that well in my entire life, so that was key. The truth is that I was afraid he would beat me 6/1 and 6/1, but I also really wanted to play this game. I was facing the world number 1, so I entered the court with a positive attitude, with the intention of winning the match. I don’t think anything like this has been seen before in tennis, so from the first moment I knew I had to dictate the exchanges so he couldn’t bring out the best version of himself.”
