(Ed. note - sorry for my continuing inability to drop into the Comments section to answer questions or add to discussion; it's a server issue that's still being worked on. Fortunately, I can read all the comments, and I'm mighty proud of your unfailingly interesting contributions, Special thanks for the kind words to those who gave them - PB)
Before I came to Melbourne,, a number of you expressed an interest in coverage of the press itself. While I don't want to go overboard on that, I don't find myself having a whole lot to say about Maria Sharapova's fantrashstic win over Anna Chakvetadze in the first quarterfinal of the day. Getting the serve to bounce on the right side of the net should not qualify as a Warrior Moment.The main press interview room here is oddly like a small lecture hall at a university. It's an amphitheater, where the player sits at a desk at the center of the open end of a horseshoe. The reporters sit in movie-theater-like seats on the steep side of the semi-circle. It isn't a bad set-up, but it's a little too formal for my taste. It does beat having the player sit behind a table on a raised dais, which I think invests too much authority in the player's chair.
I was sitting with Miguel I play just like Federer, but I also have a forehand drop shot Seabra shortly before the interview, and he told me that he was going to ask The Mighty Fed, who does, oh, two or three hundred pressers a year, what question he hasn't been asked. But Mikey, if TMF hasn't been asked, how would he know? I didn't say anything, though; it's amazing how often a mildly off-the-wall question will produce a spontaneous, telling response - if you have the Wilanders to ask it.
Anyway, we all assembled in the amphitheater when they announced Roger's presser. I'm going to go through his interview transcript, cherry-picking certain questions that have a bearing on our preoccupations here (dang! I need to ask TMF about the Warrior Moments issue tomorrow).
BTW, there are very few ground rules governing these post-match pressers. Technically speaking, they ought to revolve around the just-completed match. But reporters working on all different kinds of stories will use the PM presser to get quotes. For many of them, the PM presser is the only access they have to top players. These pressers are, theoretically, self-policing and un-orchestrated. Sometimes, the groupie quotient is a little too high at these gatherings (Kim, you're known as one of the nicest girls on the tour. How hard is it to be really, really nice when some of the other girls, like Maria, are so cold and itchy?). Yesterday, during Serena's presser, I watched one captivated local reporter as she hung on every word, nodding her head in approval as Serena spoke. She stopped short of shouting out, Teach!, but it was touch-and-go for a while there.
Anyway, TMF really does have a senatorial presence in these pressers. He's a master of reasonable discourse, to the point where sometimes you almost wish he would come out with something to which your reaction is: Did he just say what I think he said? This, though, is just my inner anarchist speaking. Roger is always measured, relaxed and calm, but you never sense that he's just blowing smoke or, like some players, either reciting the conventional talking points or overly concerned with saying nothing that would ruffle feathers. In other words, Roger is true to his elegant, balanced, thoughtful but prudent self.
The presser began with the usual opening gambit, with a reporter asking Roger to assess the match he had just played, and then somebody asked him about the wind. Tom Perrotta of the New York Sun was the first reporter to go off topic, for a piece he's doing on Tony Roche and Roger: You've been with Tony Roche for a couple years. Talk a little bit about what he brings to the table for you, and how long you expect that relationship to continue:
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Answer: Yeah, I mean, it's been a few years now. I was very happy when he said yes, you know, to work with me. It's been very interesting, you know. Especially the first few months where we had to put everything on the table, you know, where he said what he thinks about my game, where he would like to go, that we kind of have the same mindset for the future. That was quickly found, you know. We've been working very hard in practice.
I was fortunate enough that he always came over to Europe in the summer and I've had now the last three years with Tony in December, which is crucial. We work very well together. I don't see an end to it any time soon. But you know, look, he can decide whatever he wants to do really because he doesn't quite need it, you know, any more after all these years with tennis. But I'm happy if he does, so...
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Sometimes, it's hard to tell whether or not a player is finished, and cutting him off in mid-thought is a faux pas destined to get some angry looks shot your way. At the same time, because the pressers are self-regulating (despite the presence next to the player of a tournament official, who's there in case a moderator is needed), you sometimes get these awkward moments when two or three people start asking a question at the same time, which usually causes embarrassment and confusion and occasionally gets really sloppy. But I had a lightbulb-over-head moment, and followed up with a spontaneous question: What is your relation like with him in general? Is it really more like a friendship? Is there a father figure involved? Is it all business?
