After opening the 2011 ATP World Tour season by winning his third title at the Qatar ExxonMobil Open Saturday, Roger Federer made clear his intention to try and wrest back the World No. 1 South African Airways ATP Ranking from his rival Rafael Nadal this year.
The Swiss was within one win of tying Pete Sampras’ all-time record of 286 weeks at No. 1 when he was beaten by Robin Soderling in the quarter-finals of Roland Garros last May. Nadal went on to reclaim the No. 1 ranking by winning his fifth title at Roland Garros, and by the end of 2010, had extended his lead over Federer to 3,305 points following triumphs at Wimbledon and the US Open.
The gap could widen further following the Australian Open, with 2010 champion Federer defending 2,000 points and Nadal only 360. The Swiss has been in tremendous form over the past four months, though, winning 26 of his past 28 matches since reaching the US Open semi-finals (l. to Djokovic).
“We’ll see how it goes,” said Federer. “Look, obviously Rafa has a lot to defend (from April onwards), but at the same time, he’s very confident and he’s the one who is World No. 1 and has all the confidence, really.
“So it’s going to be very difficult, clearly. But if I keep playing at the level I’m playing and reaching almost all these finals lately, then obviously you feel like you’ll have a chance,” added the Swiss, who closed 2010 by defeating Nadal in the final of the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals.
“But I have to keep it up, and you need to do something special to get to World No. 1. It’s not enough to win a Grand Slam and the [Barclays ATP] World Tour Finals anymore. You almost need to do more than that, and I’m prepared for that, so we’ll see how it goes.”
Should he succeed in reclaiming the World No. 1 ranking it would be the second time he has wrested it from Nadal’s grip, having previously done so following his triumph at Wimbledon in 2009, ending Nadal’s reign of 46 consecutive weeks. That year he went on to become only the second player after Ivan Lendl in 1989 to reclaim the year-end No. 1 after losing it for a year. [Nadal became the third player to achieve the feat in 2010.]
