Rafa ready — or is he? — for Open
MELBOURNE, Australia — Roger Federer was toiling away across town at Kooyong, trying to win an exhibition tournament just two days from the start of the Australian Open, where he can tie Pete Sampras' record of 14 Grand Slams.
Novak Djokovic, the defending champion at Melbourne Park, was on a plane from Sydney, where he lost to Finland's Jarkko Nieminen in a tournament semifinal the night before, blowing a chance to overtake Federer for the No. 2 ranking.
The guy they are both chasing, top-ranked Rafael Nadal, was taking it relatively easy Saturday, having a morning practice session with the other member of the Big Four of men's tennis, resurgent Andy Murray of Britain.
Rafa wondered if perhaps he wasn't taking it too easy.
"I think I am OK," Nadal said, not sounding so sure. "But I was for two months outside of competition, so maybe I need a little bit more matches to get the rhythm."
Nadal was asked, for what he said was the 100th time in the past three months, whether being No. 1 has made any difference to him.
He ended Federer's 237-week reign at the top in early September after beating the Swiss star last year at the French Open and Wimbledon and later taking home the Beijing Olympics gold medal.
"One number doesn't change anything," Nadal said. "I was very happy to be No. 2. I am very happy, for sure, to be No. 1. Every year the season starts from zero for everybody."
Murray opens against Andrei Pavel of Romania in the same half of the draw as Nadal, who plays Christophe Rochus of Belgium in the first round. Djokovic is set to play a qualifier, while Federer's start of a very tough draw has him playing Andreas Seppi of Italy.
Federer then has possible matches against former No. 1 Carlos Moya in the second round, 2005 Australian Open champion Marat Safin in the third and Stanislas Wawrinka in the fourth. He could play Djokovic in the semifinals, where the Serbian ended Federer's Melbourne Park run last year.
