Wimbledon 2018: Roger Federer's cricket-influenced moment on court

Mutual admiration between the two living legends is a favourite gossip with all sports fans across the globe and it has only been growing since they first met in 2011. But the tennis maestro has captured the attention of cricket fans with a defensive shot when he was cruising through against Adrian Mannarino in the third set.

The reason is that he was not defending strong backhand or a smash from his opponent but only a lame shot that was called "out"! The mode of defence: a la cricket. As the ball reached him he got both his hands on the racket and pushed the ball towards the ball boy. There was no response from the crowd as such, but discerning eyes of Indians could see what he had done.

Roger Federer had revealed in the past that he plays cricket video games and always selects Tendulkar as his batsman. Federer has visited India and once had even invited Tendulkar to a match he played in Delhi against Rafael Nadal, but the spontaneity with which he did it seemed to suggest that he has a love for cricket somewhere in his heart.

The stroke was a perfect one, but it did spark off a debate among Twitter fans as to whether it was more of a defensive stroke or a smart push in between the cover and mid-off fielder for a couple of runs. There were fans who even claimed that his elbow was not high enough for that to be a perfect defensive shot!

Ratings for @rogerfederer's forward defence, @ICC?#Wimbledon pic.twitter.com/VVAt2wHPa4

— Wimbledon (@Wimbledon) July 9, 2018

Maybe he needs to be friends with Rahul Dravid now instead of Tendulkar!

All said and done, there may be many opinions on how much Federer should be given out of 10 (that was what the tweet was about), but as a winner of hearts, he certainly would get a 10/10.