ROGER FEDERER - GREATEST SPORTSMAN EVER !

Following yet another Grand Slam title for the Grand Old Man of tennis, can there be any doubt that Roger Federer is not only the greatest male tennis player ever, but also the greatest male sportsman ?

Tennis is a sport in which fitness, strength and stamina, both physical and mental, are vital. As players age, they become increasingly vulnerable to injuries and, quite simply, they begin to be overtaken by younger, fitter and more hungry newcomers. This is the general rule and, for a long time, it seemed that Federer was no exception; after winning the Australian Open in 2010, he won only one further major title in the next six years. He came close on several occasions but age and injuries seemed to have ended his winning days.

Then, completely out of the blue, he experienced a resurgence of his old powers. The Australian and Wimbledon titles in 2017 and another Australian title, his sixth and tying the record, brought his overall tally to 20 Grand Slam victories and three of the last four in which he's competed. While his great opponents of recent years, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray, all suffered injury, illness, loss of form or even, in the case of Djokovic, a loss of enthusiasm for the game, Federer kept going. The oldest of them all, he seems to defy the advancing years and goes on winning. He appears to be fitter, stronger and hungrier than players 10 and 15 years his junior, his talents are undiminished, nor is his enthusiasm for the game and still more titles.

Since his first triumph, at Wimbledon in 2003, Federer has played in 56 Grand Slam tournaments, only failing to reach at least the quarter finals on six occasions. He has reached the final an astonishing thirty times, a number unmatched by any other player ever, and has won twenty of them. Four of his Final defeats have come on the clay of Roland-Garros and at the hands of the greatest ever clay court player, Rafael Nadal; if Nadal had not existed, Federer's haul of titles could well have been even higher and he, himself, may have been considered as a true 'great' of the clay court.

Federer's victories have been spread around the tournaments much more evenly than have Nadal's. Eight at Wimbledon, six in Australia and five in the US, plus his single French win. Nadal's highly impressive total of sixteen wins includes ten in the French championship, three in the US, two at Wimbledon and just one in Australia. Excluding the French, Federer leads Nadal 19-6 in titles, surely a statistic that speaks for itself.

Over a period of 15 years Federer has been sensational. Even when he wasn't winning Grand Slams, he was still ranked in the top 3 or 4 in the world for much of the time and. rather like the golfer Jack Nicklaus, was always considered to be 'the man to beat'. Today, at the age of 36, he has become the oldest Grand Slam winner since Ken Rosewall in 1972, a time at which tennis was a very different game from what it is now.

Roger Federer is the Greatest Ever male tennis player without a shadow of a doubt. The only question is whether there are any other sportsmen, or sportswomen, in any sport who can challenge him for the position as the greatest ever in any sport.