It goes without saying that modern sports have seldom seen dominance of the stature that men’s tennis has been witnessing during the last ten years.

You just cannot find superlatives that could actually describe what one athlete of the highest order has been able to achieve on tennis courts all over the world. This Swiss maestro, Roger Federer (if you are still not there), has shown that form may be temporary but class is permanent.

I remember two years back I did a ground reality on the final of the Australian Open, call it an incident or my sheer admiration of Federer’s game, that piece was about the thumping of one Brit at the hands of The King. Yes, it was indeed the final between Federer and Murray at the Rod Laver Arena in 2010.

The 2012 Wimbledon final was a sort of a rematch of that great encounter between two of the finest exponents of the modern game. The passage of time, however, favoured Murray more than Roger Federer, who moved to the wrong side of the 30s last year. Murray, on the other hand, is edging closer to his prime and has drastically improved his game overall.

The journey to the final itself has never been easy; this year also, RF on his way to the final, had to brush aside the likes of Xavier Malisse, Mikhail Youzhny and none other than the top seed, arguably the finest tennis player in the world at the moment and the defending Wimbledon Champion Novak Djokovic of Serbia.

Murray did not have an easy ride to the final either - he had to beat Nikolay Davydenko, Ivo Karlovic, Marcos Baghdatis, Marin Cilic, David Ferrer and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga to become the first player from Britain to reach the final at Wimbledon since Bunny Austin in 1938.

The only advantage for          Andy Murray was the ouster of a certain Rafael Nadal at the hands of the 103rd seed, Lukas Rosol of the Czech Republic in the second round! Talk about upsets...

Meanwhile, Murray-mania was in full force; stories published in British newspapers and tabloids prior to this highly anticipated final suggested that the ticket-price for the match was set to top 40000 GBP!

Being a sport fanatic, I consider it a crime to say it was a waste of money; it was definitely worth every single penny, but, I still preferred enjoying the show on a comfy couch in my living room.

The British media was going gaga about the chances of Andy Murray lifting the Wimbledon title; something his countrymen have not been able to achieve since 1936. This extraordinary hype that surrounded the Gentlemen’s singles final, perhaps proved to be the downfall of the top player in Britain. Only Andy Murray would know what it feels like to be standing in the centre court against a man who had seen it all and won it all a record number of times.

With due respect to the Royal Family, I only see one king in England when Roger Federer arrives at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club in Wimbledon. And on July 8, 2012 this undisputed king of tennis showed his vintage form to beat Andy Murray to once again wrap his hands around the coveted trophy. This was Federer’s seventh Wimbledon title - a record he shares with Pete Sampras and William Renshaw. Federer also reclaimed his number one ranking in men’s tennis and last week he broke Sampras’ record of 286 weeks as the number one player in the world.

Men’s tennis has become absolutely competitive with the arrival of devastating players like Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Andy Murray and Joe Wilfred Tsonga. And it is the presence of such gifted tennis players that makes Federer’s recent achievements ever so remarkable. Unfortunately, for all fans of Roger Federer all good things come to an end and it won’t be long when we see his form fading and his ranking diminish, but, we will at least be able to tell our next generations that we lived in the time of the great, Roger Federer!