They are locked into what is becoming one of the great rivalries of sport, linked through their prowess with a tennis racquet.

But otherwise, forget it. In taste, style and appearance, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal are about as similar as a wedge of Emmenthal and a slice of mozzarella.

The Swiss from the Rhine city of Basel with a South African mother and the Mediterranean Spaniard with his clannish Majorcan family would probably never have crossed paths had it not been for the pursuit of that fuzzy yellow ball.

As sporting generations go, they are not even the same age. Federer is 26, Nadal 20. One is right-handed, the other left. One grunts as he pounds returns, the other does not. One likes clay, the other prefers grass.
Wimbledon would have to be the scene of an upset of seismic proportions this year for the tournament not to be all about Federer, the four-time defending champion and the world's top-ranked player, and Nadal, the losing finalist last year and now very much a contender for the throne. Defeat for Federer would be devastating; victory for Nadal would make him, in the eyes of many experts, the number one player in the world.

Nothing bitter about it
They have already faced each other in big finals in Monte Carlo, Hamburg and Paris this year. In the glib jargon of sports, such a rivalry is sometimes called deadly or bitter.

But for Federer and Nadal, such terminology does not work. They would probably laugh at a quote from Maureen Connolly, who won Wimbledon three times in the 1950s.

"I hated my opponents," Connolly said. "This was no passing dislike, but a powerful and consuming hate. I believed I could not win without hatred."
So did Jimmy Connors.

"It's not funny!" he screamed in the locker room of the Los Angeles Tennis Club when he was still a teenager. "Losing's not funny!"

He had just played quite well and lost to Stan Smith, who was older than he and -- for the moment -- better. But Connors couldn't take it.

Federer and Nadal don't like it, either, but they can take it. Especially when the defeat comes at the hands of the other. To an extent, professional respect eases the pain. But on a personal level, their relationship, in the context of who they are and what they are doing, is strange: They are friends.

Not bosom buddies who hang out all the time, but good enough friends for Federer to agree to play in a weird exhibition in Majorca in May in which one half of the court was clay and the other half grass. And for him to say: "It will just be a bit of fun. Not every tennis match has to be so serious, you know. And anyway, it will give me a chance to go and see Rafa at home, on his own island."

Fun? The only fun Connors and Connolly got out of tennis was winning. But the oddly matched Federer-Nadal couple has fun because the two champions do not allow themselves to become locked into the myopic world of the practice-airport-hotel-tournament syndrome that can close out reality for so many athletes.
Federer, fluent in four languages, relishes his role as a goodwill ambassador for Unicef and, with his mother's help, has set up a charity that houses, feeds and pays for the education of 30 children in a township in Port Elizabeth, South Africa.

"We are given the chance to visit so many different countries and cultures and interact with people from all walks of life," Federer has said. "It is our responsibility to connect with the real world beyond our sport, to use our fortune to make a difference in the lives of those who most need it."

One might think those words were written for him, but anyone spending time around Federer would not doubt for a moment that this was precisely what he wanted to say. More remarkable, perhaps, is that Nadal should become such an ally of his rival off court.

In Monte Carlo, the two sat side by side to denounce the speed of changes being made in the game by the leadership of the ATP, which ostensibly is the player's union but, wedded as it is to the tournament directors, has evolved into something more complicated.

Joint support
Both men spoke out in support of Monte Carlo and Hamburg and said that neither event should be downgraded from ATP Masters Series status to accommodate a change in the calendar. And it was because of what he had said that Nadal felt obliged to play in Hamburg when body and mind were screaming for a rest.

He had just won the titles in Monte Carlo, Barcelona and Rome in four weeks, and by the time he reached the final in Hamburg, he was not able to prevent his first loss ever to Federer on clay.

But hard work has long been an ethic of the Nadal clan. One of the tennis star's uncles, Miguel Nadal, the so-called "Beast of Barcelona," anchored Spain's defense in three soccer World Cups. Another uncle, Toni Nadal, ended his own modest tennis career to start coaching the 4-year-old Rafael, a job he holds to this day.
Physically, they are a powerful bunch but, even so, the young tennis champion is exceptional.

"Mentally, he is so tough because he wants every single point, no matter what the score," said Emilio Sánchez, a former top-10 player, who runs the Casal-Sánchez tennis camp near Barcelona. "But physically, he is incredible. Most athletes have either muscles for sprinting or for long distance. Rafa has both. I have never seen that before."

So despite the hours he has spent on the demanding clay courts of Europe this spring, Nadal is likely to be quick enough and fit enough to embark on the long road to a Wimbledon final, where most connoisseurs of the game will be hoping that Federer awaits.

Opposite ends
As the top two seeds, they will start at opposite ends of the draw and scan the names that lie between them for potential dangers. The good news for Nadal is that talented grass-court players are few and far between in this age of the vanishing serve-and-volleyer. Reacting to criticism a decade ago that fast, low-bouncing grass courts were producing virtually no rallies against big servers with powerful racquets, conditions have been significantly altered at Wimbledon to change the way the game is played.

This means a Nadal or a Lleyton Hewitt, who is playing well enough to become a factor again this year, can spend time in the back court before attempting a sortie to the net. Pure volleyers like Tim Henman are disadvantaged.

But Nadal will be on the lookout for a Henman or a veteran doubles expert like Jonas Bjorkman, a Wimbledon singles semifinalist last year, because these are the type of players who can cause trouble for a man who is still learning his grass-court trade.

Federer, the supreme stylist, will fear no one because he is now the best grass-court player in the world. But should his friend Rafa appear on the other side of the net on the final day, Federer's Swiss mind will focus on what is perhaps dearest to him: his Wimbledon crown. Having won the past four years, he is in pursuit of Bjorn Borg's incredible run of five successive triumphs, and few doubt that he can do it.

International Herald Tribune