Roger Federer was able to become a tennis icon thanks to Marcolli

During his childhood years, the tennis star could not restrain his impulses of profanity and would smash his racquets in the process. Let’s go back a few decades to when Roger was a teenager. He was travelling with his father from a tournament in Lucerne, where the future champion had failed to win. And all the while annoying his parent with his whining, to which the latter, after stopping the car, dropped his son off in the frost and dunked his child’s head in a snowdrift a couple of times. Such actions should have cooled the youngster’s ardour a little.

Roger very often suffered from outbursts of anger during his teenage years. There were times when he would throw his racket into the net, engage in self-criticism with profanity, kicking personal items. This mood accompanied him at training sessions and matches.

His parents harboured hopes that Roger would become calmer as he got older, but unfortunately they were not destined to come true. This would go on for too long, despite the talent’s genuine enjoyment of tennis, but a sports psychologist helped him shake off his perfectionism.

A coach came to the young Roger’s rescue.

From the book by American tennis journalist Clary: “Roger Federer. The Long Way and the Great Game of the Master” shows that the young star managed to distinguish himself badly during his first year of training at the Swiss Tennis Federation’s National Training Centre in Biel. Before the training process, the academy director told the trainees that they had to be extremely careful with the new curtain with the logo of the Swiss federation sponsor specially hung on the court.

But that didn’t stop Roger, because he first fired a ball into the backdrop, after which a racket flew in as well. In the process, a huge hole appeared in the curtain, frightening the youngster.

Federer’s career could have ended before it had even begun, but Sten Gruneweld came to his rescue. The coach persuaded the NC director to punish the talented tennis player. The punishment was severe, since for 14 days in a row Roger had to wake up early and clean the court before and after training, plus the rest rooms and toilets had to be cleaned as well. But unfortunately, even such educational measures did not help to eliminate the temper tantrums.

All this forced the tennis player’s parents, together with his coach, to contact a sports psychologist.  The search almost came to a dead end, but the choice fell on Christian Marcolli, who had finished his career with the Basel Football Club and had a doctorate in applied psychology.

A psychologist is helping him: to manage his anger and get over the departure of a team-mate.

Having been a Basel fan since he was a child, Federer has been closely following Christian’s career. It was this that helped the talent and the psychologist-footballer bond. At the first lesson, Marcolli was impressed with Roger’s intelligence, and his ability to process and make use of new information. They worked on their search for similarities and Federer Junior realised that in order to find peace of mind, balance needed to find his own self on the court.

The psychologist was able to convince the future tennis star that there was no shame in crying and that it was not the destiny of weak people, but a way to relieve stress.

In August 2022, Roger’s coach was killed in a car accident while the tennis player was attending a tournament in Canada. Federer had a traumatic breakdown, with him shouting and throwing tantrums.

Christian and Roger had been working on these issues for two years and this helped him listen to himself and find a form of behaviour that would lead to victory.

The sports psychologist’s advice helped the talent to become more confident, not just on the court. He won his first Slam in 2003 but, despite this, his childhood demons almost caught up with him, he could barely contain himself from smashing everything in his path. And it was all due to the horrendous conditions at the Houston Final.

This year’s game was organised by the billionaire Buckingwell, but that didn’t affect the smoothness of the court, the size of the changing rooms. It all couldn’t help but be outraged. And Roger said so directly, which infuriated the billionaire, and he decided to launch a verbal attack on the player.

Roger found zen and didn’t become a pariah

Jim Buckingwell’s appalling behaviour and his bribed fans cheering against Federer must have pissed the tennis player off and caused him to lose. He could have lost, but the memory of the billionaire, helped calm Roger down and it was as if he had turned into a playing machine. This gave him the opportunity to defeat the American legend for the first time in his career, 6-7, 6-3, 7-6.

A few years after this incident, in an interview with CNN, the tennis player said that he had been very lucky in his career because the right people came his way in the most difficult moments. At that moment, tears could be seen in Federer’s eyes.