The immutable law of decay says Roger Federer is running out of days on Centre Court, but he is holding on to them beautifully. Any win by the six-times Wimbledon champion on his favourite turf is a declaration of ownership, a warning to his younger rivals not to mistake success for immortality.
A Federer victory is a royal performance. As the three big names of the men's competition came out to play on middle Saturday, Federer toyed with David Nalbandian at the end of the third set as if reluctant to leave the stage. Why not stay a while longer and try a few sadistically good shots?
When Nalbandian was finally dispatched 6-4, 6-2, 6-4, Federer threw half his kit into the crowd and headed for the second week knowing that, behind this bravura, threats abound.
The first of the golden-agers to show signs of cracking was Novak Djokovic, the youngest of the trio, who hammered the ground with his racket three times after losing control of the second set in his match against Marcos Baghdatis. Djokovic, who came through in four sets, treated the crowd to one of the more memorable fits of temper, smashing his instrument with real fury on a court where Federer had charmed the congregation.
Rafael Nadal, Djokovic, Federer: surely a vintage band, even without Andy Murray, whose task is to surmount these mighty barriers. With his tantrums, though, Djokovic cast doubt on his ability to threaten the old order. The day closed with a vivid display of drama queenery as Djokovic punished himself for his errors and appealed to his camp for absolution.
When it was over Murray still faced the winners of 28 grand slam titles. Federer's 16 are being hunted down by Nadal, who has 10, while Djokovic, lean and mean, is sure to extend his current haul of two Australian Open wins, if not here. Federer is 29, Nadal 25 and Djokovic a year younger again.
Even their words fizz across the net, vying to win debates. Nadal thinks today's top four are more consistently successful and "focused mentally" than earlier household names. Federer disagrees, saying: "It's not fair to say that our generation is stronger. For many years people said it was weaker, because there was only me and then there was only Rafa and me. All of a sudden there's people talking about four. Now it's the best ever. This is where I disagree. It doesn't happen so quickly."
We can leave them to this conversational five-setter. The strength of the men's division is juxtaposed of course by the hierarchical muddle of the women's game, an unsatisfying democracy of industrially coached hopefuls, mostly from eastern Europe, plus the Williams sisters.
The last time we witnessed such a convergence of male talent was when Pete Sampras duked it out with Andre Agassi before Federer took over as the squire of Centre Court. "The only thing I can say is that before, in my opinion, the top four players didn't play as solidly [he meant consistently] as they do today," said Nadal, who saw off Gilles Müller to earn a fourth-round tie against Juan Martín del Potro. Nadal spoke of the new breed chasing world ranking points outside the four grand slams and being in contention at every tournament.
"Probably in the past that didn't happen a lot," he said. "That's probably because of two things: the courts are a little bit slower, so the best have a little more chance to play the points, and if you have more time to play the best players have better chances to win." Federer fires that back: "I remember when Pete and Andre and [Stefan] Edberg and [John] McEnroe and all those guys were still around. It was very good already. It's just that Rafa and myself took a lot of the grand slams and didn't allow anybody else to shine, really.
"Ten, 20 years ago, when they were doing [one thing] well they were doing it excellently. Like Pete's serve. I still think it would be one of the great serves in the game today if not the best. Agassi maybe didn't have that serve but he had the return that many players don't have today.
"Today we're more overall, the conditions have slowed down, and that allows us to maybe win the French Open and Wimbledon back to back a bit more easily than back in the day when you had grass court specialists, hard court specialists, indoor specialists, clay court specialists. Today everyone can play everywhere. That's the way the game has evolved and we're adjusting to it."
A statistical blizzard blows across Wimbledon's second week, as Nadal, who won his 17th consecutive Wimbledon tie, attempts to emulate Bjorn Borg's three French Open-Wimbledon doubles and Federer closes in on Sampras' seven All England Club titles. Against Baghdatis, Djokovic was trying to restore the momentum of his 43-match winning run, which was broken by Federer at Roland Garros.
The two greats, who have shared every Wimbledon singles titles since Lleyton Hewitt borrowed it in 2002, gave Djokovic a lesson in self-possession. Federer said earlier: "I learned my lesson early on in my career when I used to under-estimate opponents because of the way they played, or just said – I can't lose against this guy on grass. Next thing you know, that's what's happens.
"This is where you have to be very, very mentally strong. With the success I've had here comes a pressure. But as well this is where I'm able to shift up a couple of gears on grass because it works to my strengths." From now on it gets deeply adversarial, and compelling.
