The crowd was seated at the Foro Italico, site of the stadium for the 1960 Rome Olympics, and they were ready for a battle: Federer-Nadal VI. Federer and Nadal were ready to meet for the second time in a month in the long run up to the French Open that culminates next week in Hamburg. Let the battle begin.

Federer and Nadal played even through the first two sets with each taking a tiebreaker. Federer was serving well and attacking the net successfully and Nadal was doing what he does – put up a wall of defense and hit inside out forehands for winners.

Couldn’t we just watch these two play every Sunday?

With Federer serving at 2-2 in the third set, Nadal passed him twice to get a break. Nadal was making it hard for Federer to attack by pinning him to the baseline and Federer started to lose rhythm on his forehand. He whacked a ball with his racket after one point and kicked another ball out of frustration.

He regained his composure and held his serve easily throughout the set but Nadal held onto the break to win it 6-4. Of course, easy is a relative concept. Against Nadal you have to hit two or three good shots when only one would would be enough aganst any other player.

Nadal had two more break points in the first game of the fourth set but Federer found his forehand and hammered enough of them to win the game. You don’t think of Nadal’s grace as much as you do his strength but he has such control of the racket that he can hit the ball to unexpected places even when he is hopelessly out of position. You do think of grace when Federer comes to mind and it was a joy to watch him hit a sharp volley or slide into a forehand wide and hook it sharply cross court. He used one such shot to pass Nadal in the third game and got a break point. It took one more break point but Federer went up 3-1 in the set.

Federer was consistently getting his ground strokes deep enough to cause errors and give himself plenty of opportunities to get to the net. He was serving well and returning well. Nadal had been hitting virtually all off his serves to Federer’s backhand and Federer had finally adjusted. A Nadal backhand error gave Federer another break and the fourth set, 6-2. Federer won 60% of the points in the set.

Up 2-1 in the fifth set, Federer hit another deep forehand down the line to get a break point and went up 3-1. Could he finally beat Nadal after four straight losses?

Not easily. Federer was up 40-15 in the next game but Nadal hit a good return and Federer hit an error to give Nadal a break point. He hit another error to give Nadal a second break point but Federer saved that with an ace and won the game. This was a brilliant tennis match.

Federer hit two unforced errors to start the next service game, you can expect that if you’re forced to keep the ball deep, and gave Nadal the break back. Nadal had recovered from a bad third set and now he was hitting deft drop shots and strong passing shots. Not that Federer was done. In the next game, Nadal hit a drop shot to Federer’s backhand. Federer ran in and hit it down the line. Nadal took it out of the air and put it over Federer’s head. Federer ran backwards and stabbed the ball with a backhand overhead that landed at Nadal’s feet. He put his racket in front of the ball and got it over the net but Federer took the response and hit a shot down the line past Nadal.

Couldn’t we just watch these two play every Sunday?

Nadal had a golden opportunity to get a break point with Federer serving at 4-4 but he made a rare mistake. He ran around his backhand then overhit a forehand wide. In their last match it was Federer who explained his unforced errors by saying that he had to go for better shots against Nadal. After losing the fourth set, Nadal is the one who now felt that he had to go for more.

After more than four and a half hours, Nadal served at 4-5 and had to win the game or lose his 52 game winning streak. After both players held serve, Nadal was in exactly the same position serving at 5-6. This match was certainly not about statistics but one of them popped out: and 85% first serve percentage for Nadal. That is extraordinary. Still, he put up his first double fault in the game to go down 0-30. At this critical point in the match, Federer faltered. Nadal hit four straight balls well inside the service line on the next point and Federer didn’t attack. It cost him the match.

Nadal hit another error and Federer had two match points. Two errant forehands by Federer and two good ones by Nadal and Federer had lost his chance. Nadal sprinted along the baseline to clear the red dirt, jumped into his prizefighters bounce step and the tiebreaker began.

Up 2-1 in the tiebreaker, Federer got to the net, where he should have been much sooner, and got the mini-break. As the clock ticked past five hours, Nadal mishit a forehand and Federer went up 5-3. Nadal had twice served to stay in the set, the second time from 0-30 down, and now he was down 5-3 in the tiebreaker.

I thought I was watching the match live but I was wrong. At this point, for some reason, I clicked on the Rome website to look at the results and saw the final score for the match. I could not believe my eyes. Had they posted it incorrectly?

Federer hit three errors in a row, only one under duress, and Nadal had his first match point. I still couldn’t believe it. Federer hit a ball off the baseline line tentatively, Nadal took it and hit a strong inside out forehand and the match was over.

That was four straight points for Nadal and he had now matched Guillermo Vilas’ 53 game winning streak on clay. That’s entirely appropriate. Nadal is not the Bull of the Pampas but he’s the most willfull tennis player I’ve ever seen.

Federer may be psychologically stronger than the rest of us but this has to hurt. He did exactly what he said he had to do: attack the net and serve well. His backhand even held up and yet he still he could not kill Nadal. He’s beginning to sound like a broken record. After the match he said, “… I already knew after Monaco (Monte Carlo) I was extremely close. I think this is another step closer because I got even closer to the win today than back then. So I’m on the right track.” Isn’t this what he says after every loss to Nadal?

Yes it is and you can call me crazy, but I think he’ll win Hamburg. He’s won it three times already and that could give him enough confidence to get past the immense wall that is Rafael Nadal.