Lukas Lacko, 30, is the very best tennis player in Slovakia and the 73rd best in the world. Judged by any measures except the ones that matter to him most, he has an extraordinary talent. And on Wednesday, for the latest but not the last time in his life as a professional, he had to confront its limits. It was Lacko’s luck to be drawn against Roger Federer in the second round at Wimbledon. And so in a turn of events only a little less predictable than nightfall Lacko’s tournament was over for another year. It took Federer three sets and 90 minutes to end it for him, 6-4, 6-4, 6-1.
Federer spent the first set measuring Lacko’s casket, the second and third burying him in it. At one pointthe Swiss won 35 points in a row on his own serve. His service games were running at an average duration of around 70 seconds each. Lacko spent most of that time chasing aces. Then he set himself to the arduous task of trying to hold his own serve, a business that took several minutes. He was broken once in the first set, once in the second and three times in the third. For Federer the hard part was keeping himself interested. Which is why he kept mixing up his shots and trying for wild winners.
Federer explained he thought it was “important to have fun” in these early matches. “Of course sometimes you play the percentages but, if you do that too much, it gets a bit boring, so I like to mix it up as much as possible.” So, after 20 years of hard work and hustle, of grinding through the Junior, Futures, Challenger and World tours, it is Lacko’s lot to end up as just so much Federer fodder. Well, there are worse ways to make a living than by losing to the greatest of all time. He earned £63,000 from it and a story for his grandkids, too.
Still, this kind of stooge-work surely was not what Lacko had in mind for himself when he was ranked the third-best junior player in the world in 2005. Back then he must have dreamed he would be the one everyone was cheering on. But the closer he has got to the top, the further he has been from reaching it. This was his 19th match against a top-10 player and his 19th defeat. At this point Lacko, like the rest of Federer’s opponents in these early rounds, is pretty much just playing the role of Wimbledon’s Washington Generals.
The Generals, of course, are the team who have to lose to the Harlem Globetrotters every night. No one wants to see them win, even if they ever actually could. They’re there to make the Globetrotters look good. The only cheers they get are ironic ones. Lacko got a couple of those too, and the wags who did got a lot of knowing laughs from everyone else. Federer, meanwhile, gets an ovation just for walking out on Centre Court and another for getting up out of his chair. The All England Club is to Federer what the sea is to a great white shark. And Lacko was just another hapless swimmer.
A lot of the fans here have come just for the chance to see Federer play. They do not talk about having tickets for the tennis but tickets for him. “I hear what they say,” Federer said. “They get asked: ‘Who are you here to see?’ Your name drops, it’s always very exciting, I must tell you.” He says he has a dream about going out to meet them in the queue. “I just want to walk past them and speak to these people, to hear their stories. That’s something I’ve always wanted to do.” But then he thinks better of it. “Then you’re like: ‘Nah, maybe not.’ Who knows how they’re going to react?”
Federer’s own progress is more predictable. He has now won 26 consecutive sets at Wimbledon. One has to go back to the semi-finals in 2016 to find the last time he lost one. It is not his longest streak here; he reeled off 34 in a row in 2005 and 2006. But it is getting there. But, given the way his Championships are shaping, he may well beat that record next week. At the start of play on Wednesday his career record against the 15 men left in his quarter of the draw was played 76, won 68. The only man among them who has beaten him more than once is Gaël Monfils. It might be a while yet before Federer is worrying about anything more than how much fun he and his fans are having.
Cilic frustrated by slippery conditions
There were strange scenes as dusk fell on Court No 1 on Wednesday night as Wimbledon officials made a doomed attempt to finish off the second-round match between Marin Cilic and Guido Pella, even though play had been suspended on the outside courts because of slippery conditions.
Cilic cut a frustrated figure as he made his way back to the locker room. The third seed had led 6-3, 6-1, 3-2 before a rain delay and had seemed ambivalent about whether or not to continue when he walked back on court shortly after 8pm.
Serving at 3-3, he slipped and handed Pella the chance to break – and the Argentinian world No 82 converted at the second time of asking to give himself hope of pulling off an unlikely comeback.
Milos Raonic used his awesome serve and grinding efficiency to outlast John Millman, who was disappointed to lose 7-6 (4), 7-6 (4), 7-6 (4). The 13th seed will play Dennis Novak in the third round after the Austrian qualifier surprised France’s Lucas Pouille, the 17th seed in a match that went the distance.
Sam Querrey secured a routine win over Sergiy Stakhovsky. The 11th seed will face Gaël Monfils after the enigmatic Frenchman fought back from a set down to beat Italy’s Paolo Lorenzi 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (5), 7-6 (3). Jacob Steinberg
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