AP
Pospisil/Raonic d. Nadal/Djokovic 5-7, 6-3, 10-8
That was, well….Raonic.
You can still call them the “dream team” if you want, so long as you understand that some dreams are intended to be fleeting and you almost always wake up not remembering anything.
And that’s ok, because on the “Benedict Cumberbatch” scale of badass names, Milos Raonic and Vasek Pospisil score an 8.5.
In other doubles news not remotely related to the official doubles tour, Fed revealed how he was approached by Rafa to pair up a few years back in Madrid (he turned him down):
“Then I think our rivalry was so intense, I just felt like it was the wrong thing to do,” Federer said. “It would have been great for the game, but I think it would have been a bit of a curveball for everybody. It was fierce rivals, now all a sudden they’re being friendly. I don’t think the press would have enjoyed that so much. They want to put us against each other, not with each other. But today I think we’re much more laid back, me especially, too, because I didn’t have a rival for a long period of time, and then Rafa came up.”
-- Toronto Sun
Frankly? No.
This is about maintaining a mindset, a singularity of purpose about your rival and not wanting anything or anyone to interfere with that. Completely understandable.
But let’s be clear about this: the fans would have had a field day and so too, I suspect, would the press.
Sure, the spectacle of the top two players buddying up would warp some people out irrevocably and you’d get the odd article on how it might somehow “dent their singles rivalry”, but it’s not as if it was going to happen that regularly anyway.