Q. Just on tennis globally, I think there is 95 Europeans in the main draw, and there are South Americans as well. Do you think there is ever a way for Australia and America to get back to something like the glory days with all the European dominance? And what do you think the reason is for this European dominance?
ROGER FEDERER: Never really thought about it. I mean, I definitely think America and Australia can get back sooner than later definitely. Why Europeans, I don't know. I guess it's just a trend right now like it used to be a trend that America and Australia had such great players. I guess it comes in phases.
Maybe courts slowing down a bit has helped Europeans a bit, especially if you think about Spain and how they grow up sort of hitting I think they work a lot out of the basket, you know. So the ball comes slow and they can really accelerate through the ball; whereas an American and maybe an Australian are more used to playing on a faster court where the ball comes to you. So they're not so used to going to the ball and hitting it, which for the Spaniards is absolutely normal.
That's maybe why the slower conditions have helped the Europeans to make their move who grew up playing on clay. I also grew up playing on clay courts. Yeah, so that's also why I think also today you don't see a guy who can only play on hardcourt. Today everybody can play on all the different surfaces. That's definitely from slowing down the game with the balls and the surfaces.
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