It was 10 years ago, on February 13, 2000, that Roger Federer played his first ATP Tour singles final.
Federer faced a familiar face in the first final, countryman Marc Rosset, and, after a strong start, lost a nail-bitter 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 (5) in the final of the Marseille Open in France. The match between the two Swiss players marked the first time in the history of the ATP that two players from Switzerland competed in a singles final. Since his debut final performance, Federer has gone on to reach 86 more ATP finals, winning 62 championships, including his most recent, the 2010 Australian Open, his 16th major singles title.
Rene Stauffer, in his book THE ROGER FEDERER STORY: QUEST FOR PERFECTION ($24.95, New Chapter Press, www.RogerFedererBook.com), describes the start of Federer’s 2000 season and the lead in to this first final in this book excerpt below.
The year 2000 began even better for Roger Federer than the previous year. At the opening event of the season in Adelaide, he finally experienced his first ATP match victory at an outdoor tournament, defeating Jens Knippschild of Germany in the first round, before losing to the Swede Thomas Enqvist. At the Australian Open, he beat former French champion Michael Chang en route to the third round before losing to Arnaud Clement of France. However, Federer continued to post his best results indoors. Playing indoors in Zurich against Australia in the first round of the Davis Cup, he defeated Mark Philippoussis and, with teammate Lorenzo Manta, topped Wayne Arthurs and Sandon Stolle, to give Switzerland a 2-1 lead. However, when in position to clinch the win for Switzerland, he narrowly lost to Lleyton Hewitt 6-2, 3-6, 7-6 (2), 6-1 as Australia defeated the Swiss 3-2.
Just eight days after his Davis Cup loss to Hewitt, Federer achieved a career milestone—his first ATP tournament final. He advanced into the championship match at the ATP event in Marseille, France, where he faced, of all people, his friend and countryman Marc Rosset in the final. At this time, Roger’s world ranking was No. 67, which was 10 places better than the six-foot-seven-inch man from Geneva. However, despite winning the first set, Federer lost to Rosset on this day, falling by a narrow 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 (5) margin. Only 12 days later, nearly the same scenario repeated itself in London when Federer and Rosset squared off again—this time in the quarterfinals. Once again, Federer won the first set, but lost the match. As in Marseille, Federer watched as Rosset went on to win the tournament. The title ended up being the last ATP title for the 1992 Olympic champion.
Despite the defeats to Rosset, Federer creacked the top 50 in the world rankings. Having achieved his goal already for the season, he now quickly set his sights on reaching the top 25.