2005 Australian Open - Day #7
By Eleanor Preston  |  January 23, 2005

On Tuesday night we will see at first hand the differences between Roger Federer and Andre Agassi as they square up to each other in the Australian Open quarter final. But for those of you who cannot wait - Agassi has a few tips on how to tell them apart. "He has hairier legs," the great man said. Well, that's sorted that then.

The better Roger Federer gets, the more questions people ask. Is he the greatest ever? Is he better than Sampras? Who is the greatest grand slam champion? These and many more imponderables will occupy the minds of the tennis cognoscenti, a sad bunch who really ought to get out more.

Actually, the answers are quite simple. If you want to know the difference between Roger Federer and Pete Sampras, ask Agassi. He knows. He'll put it all in a nutshell.

"The difference between them right now," Agassi explained, "is 10 grand slams. That's a lot." That said, Agassi has every faith in Federer to improve on his current tally of trophies. "Pete was a great champion," he said, "and Roger has proven that every day."

Whether he can prove it again on Tuesday depends on Agassi's 34 year old and relatively hair-free legs. On Sunday those under-pinnings were kept jumping for 158 minutes as Agassi slowly and carefully dismantled Joachim Johansson 6-7, 7-6, 7-6, 6-4. Quite how he did it, he does not know, but he is through to have a crack at Federer and he cannot wait.

"You look forward to the challenge and the opportunity to play Roger," Agassi said. "He's been playing the best tennis in the world for a while now. Someone has to beat him sooner or later, right? I hope it's Tuesday night."

To get that chance took considerable patience and a good deal of skill. The tall Swede battered down 51 aces - a new match record - but still came out on the losing side. On the other hand, Agassi did not make one unforced error in the first set and still could not win it. The trick to dealing with such power is, apparently, not to get ahead of yourself.

"You're not climbing the whole mountain at once," Agassi said. "You're taking one step at a time. The most important point is the next one.

"All I can try to do is not be overwhelmed out there. I'm worried about embarrassment when I come out there and a guy can serve 51 aces. I'm surviving. So it's very important for me to win any point that I can, I don't care what the score is."

In the old days, Agassi had Federer's number and beat him whenever they met. That all changed at the Tennis Masters Cup in Houston two years ago. From being match point down in their round robin match, Federer came back to win and from there took off and won the title. That was a turning point in the Swiss maestro's career - suddenly he knew he could win tough, not just pretty. Since then Agassi has not had a sniff of a chance against him. Federer has every confidence that the same will apply in the quarter final.

"On a day where I'm not playing perfect, I know I can beat him," Federer said simply. "He's not as good as he was when he was at the top of the ranking, otherwise he would be there. Fortunately, I'm there. I think he has to raise his game, not me."

Serena Williams rather thinks she has to raise her game, too. She stumbled through her 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 encounter with Nadia Petrova and she was not happy.

"My serve was horrible," she announced. "I've been working really hard on it. I'm a perfectionist and I played a really bad game today. To be honest, I didn't deserve to win the way I played. But I guess I had better get over it."

She had better get over it fast as she now faces Amelie Mauresmo who wasted little time an less energy in defeating Evgenia Linetskaya.

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