ROGER FEDERER: THE WEIGHT OF HISTORY

History can mean everything in a sporting event. When you want to predict who will win and who will lose, history is your best predictor. Since chance events can intervene when fate or destiny comes calling, history will not always be right. If you want to play the percentages, always go with history and you will be right more than you will be wrong.
Take the case of Roger Federer's first round match at Wimbledon yesterday. Roger Federer, the number one ranked tennis player in the world, faced Alejandro Falla, the 60th ranked player in the world. Federer had lost only 5 times in 56 appearances at Wimbledon. He had won this major championship six times. In contrast, Falla had only played 18 times at Wimbledon, and won only 7 matches. He had never advanced beyond the second round.
Going into the match, history was clearly on Federer's side. Everybody in the sporting world expected him to win, as did Federer himself. Falla, on the other hand, would certainly have expected himself to lose to the best player in the world. No matter how hard he would have tried to convince himself that anybody can win on any given day, he was up against the expectations of history. Somewhere in his psyche, he knew that he was most likely to lose.
Then the unexpected happened. In a three set match, Falla surprisingly wins the first two sets by close scores, 7-5 and 6-4. Here he was , 60th ranked, beating the best player in the world. In the third set, the score is close, but Falla loses the set 6-4. You can only imagine his internal reactions. History would dictate that he would be saying to himself, "Oh, no, here it comes. I am going to lose no matter how hard I try." He manages to battle in a losing cause, dropping the fourth set in a tie breaker, 7-6. He is now spent and out of gas fighting the history and expectations. He loses the last set, 6-0, as he is completely exhausted from fighting the two foes. Federer is tough enough to beat even on a bad day. Add in history, and the job becomes nearly impossible.
Sports abound with examples of the weight of great expectations burying the hopes of some newcomer who flourishes for some brief time before falling under the weight of history. No matter what the score or how bad things look at any given moment, always go with history. It won't let you down.