A few days after the 2001 US Open, I travelled to the Swiss National Tennis Centre in Biel, Switzerland to interview 20-year-old Roger Federer and his team, including the late Peter Carter, for an article that you can read below. The idea was to look back at his win over Pete Sampras, get a sense of who Federer was, and what he might be about to do next.

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Pete Sampras barely knew what to do. Approaching the net on Wimbledon's Center Court as a beaten man for only the second time in nine years, Sampras stared across the court to where a young man, ten years his junior, lay on the grass crying.

Roger Federer after defeating pete sampras at Wimbledon IN 2001

Roger Federer had just come of age. Seconds earlier, the 19-year-old Swiss had sent another majestic, and this time lethal forehand flashing past the seven-time champion. The American had thrown the proverbial kitchen sink at Federer but the youngster had sent it back with interest, and as they shook hands, it seemed Sampras had finally found a successor worthy of carrying his baton of greatness into the new millennium.

Ever since he humbled the most prolific Grand Slam winner in history, memories of that day have been on show at the Swiss National Tennis Centre, an hour's train ride from Federer's home in Basel. Kids half his size and half his age fly around the courts, pummeling forehands and hoping to follow in his footsteps. Posters with his picture adorn the walls, and the red shirt he wore at the US Open hangs on display in a glass cabinet. That thrilling five set win over Sampras made him a household name in Switzerland and turned heads around the world, but the Roger Federer story has only just begun.

He still lives at the family home with father Robert and mother Lynette (who works in the accreditation department of the Davidoff Swiss Indoors in Basel), and first picked up a racquet at the age of three. At 14 he had to make a choice between his two favorite sports - tennis and soccer. A fanatical supporter of Basel's football team, he decided to make soccer a hobby, and tennis his career.

One of the first people to work with him at that age was Dutchman Sven Groeneveld, former coach to Greg Rusedski, Nicolas Kiefer and Tommy Haas.

"He had the ability to hit all the shots," remembers Groeneveld. "But he was taking full swings, hitting the ball hard and low over the net, and missing. I decided to put another net on top of the existing one to make him put more height on his strokes. It forced him to hit a heavy spin and get some depth, but he got upset. 'I don't want to play like this,' he told me. But once I'd explained to him that it was a shot he needed in a match, he accepted it."

Right from the beginning it was obvious that this was no ordinary boy. Tall, athletic and with a bob of brown curls on his head, he played dashing, daring, wonderfully cavalier tennis, hitting shots that few players could dream up on their most wildly imaginative day. He even gave one of them a name - the 'Cliffhanger'.

"He hits it as hard as he can, but with so much spin that it drops like a rock and goes in," explained Groeneveld.

Even for a professional player, it's almost unplayable. Basically, the ball flies towards you, swerving right to left, hits the ground, turns completely the opposite direction, and then springs up at you like a dog that hasn't seen its owner for a month (I know this because he hit three 'Cliffhangers' in my general direction by way of illustration. The first left me swinging at thin air, the second whistled past my ear, and the third hit me smack in the face).

Even as a teenager, Federer earned comparisons to the very best players in the world, including Pete Sampras. They both used the same Wilson racquet, both played with a classical, languid style, and both moved around the court like a cat.

But Federer was still just a boy, and an immature one at that. His match against Sampras at Wimbledon would later lead on-lookers to describe him as 'Borg-like', but as a junior, he was nothing of the sort.

"I was very surprised when people started to compare me to Borg because I always had the feeling that I the was the opposite to him," said Federer. "When I was young, I was really carrying on like an idiot on the court. My parents were going nuts in the stands. It was ridiculous. My father was saying 'just relax, don't freak out', but I was convinced that I knew best."

At junior level it didn't seem to make much difference to his results. He was so good that he could compete with, and beat, virtually anyone who crossed his path. Even when things got tight, his natural talent would see him through.

Rene Stauffer, tennis correspondent for Swiss Newspaper Tages Anzeiger, vividly remembers the first time he saw Federer play.

"I was stunned by three things," said Stauffer. "The power and pureness of his shots, the terrible way he behaved after mistakes - he threw racquets and cursed all the time - and his ability to win even if things went wrong."

The match he had watched, against Lleyton Hewitt at the World Youth Cup in Zurich in the summer of 1996, was played before anyone had really heard of Federer, but the Swiss saved a match point to win it 7-6 in the third set. It began what now looks likely to be one of the next great rivalries in men's tennis.

In 1998, Federer ended the year as the No.1 junior in the world and won the Wimbledon Boys singles and doubles titles. Three days after those triumphs at the All England Club, he wandered into the press room at the Swiss Open in Gstaad, clutching a multi-colored mobile telephone that looked as if it belonged in a cartoon. He sat down to talk to the Swiss journalists, and the next day, at just 16 years of age, he made his professional debut. He was a boy in a man's world, and to Federer it was all just a big game.

The Swiss media though, were already wondering if this might be the next Boris Becker. They'd seen the excitement generated by Becker's Wimbledon win as a 17-year-old, and fancied some of the same.

But while Becker was already a man at 17, Federer wasn't even close to full maturity. He showed glimpses of his talent in 1999 to break into the top 100, but as he entered his 20th year, he still hadn't made the splash that some people expected. While Hewitt rose consistently, eventually winning the US Open and finishing the year as the No.1 player in the world in 2001, Federer's form was hit and miss, and the pressure began to build.

"Why do I lose all the close matches?" he asked desperately, after a three set tussle with Jiri Novak in Monte Carlo had gone against him in 2000.

Other tough losses followed. Andrei Medvedev beat him in Rome, Arnaud di Pasquale denied him the bronze medal at the Sydney Olympics, and perhaps most painfully, Thomas Enqvist took victory in their five set final in Basel - his home town event.

It was apparent that Federer needed more than just natural talent to fully realize his potential. He would play irresistible tennis for a set and a half, establish a lead but often lose his concentration, his mind and then the match. If he did grind his way through, he invariably used up so much physical and mental energy in the process, that there was nothing left in the tank for the next day.

Two things needed to happen. First, he needed to calm down on court. When he played, it seemed that every shot had to be perfect, otherwise he would lose his temper. He spent so much energy shouting into the sky, cursing every missed shot and flinging his racquet around, that when it really mattered, he had no reserves to call on. It was fabulously entertaining to watch, but enormously draining for him.

"I think that I have finally realized," said Federer, with a grin. "My coaches, Peter Carter before, and Peter Lundgren now, told me that throwing my racquet, getting pissed off and screaming didn't help my game, but I just didn't agree with them. I had the feeling that I had to release my anger somehow and I always told myself that I play better when I do. Now I realize that it is better when I show less emotions, concentrate more on my game and lose less energy."

These days, he releases his excess energy off court instead. He and Lundgren play video games and watch movies together, and for the Swedish 36-year-old, the challenge of keeping Federer occupied off the court is almost as important as fine-tuning his groundstrokes.

"It's a full-time job to keep him entertained," said Lundgren, who reached No.25 in the world as a player. "That's why during the Ericsson Open in Miami, we moved to South Beach. We could go down to the beach, take a swim, get in the car, play loud music, and he could scream. You have to let him."

Secondly, Lundgren knew that Federer needed to be physically stronger. Just like Sampras at 19, he needed to grow into his body, so they enlisted the help of physical trainer Pierre Paganini. Having worked with a variety of players, including Marc Rosset and the Maleeva sisters, Paganini knew what made tennis players tick.

"There were two objectives," he said. "The first objective was to make him faster, stronger, and to have more endurance. The second was to use those qualities at the right moment on the court.”

Federer's previous coach, Australian Peter Carter had worked with him from the age of 11, all the way through his 18th birthday, before Carter passed the reigns onto Lundgren. The task of nurturing a young man through adolescence was sometimes a difficult one, but the pair have remained close friends and Carter feels proud when he sees what Federer has achieved, on and off the court.

"He definitely wasn't the kind of guy that would hit 20 cross court forehands and it was difficult to come up with something new for him every time, but I've seen an improvement in him," said Carter. “It's nice to see how he has developed. He's maturing as player and a person. I've never heard people talk bad about him. He can be a pain, but he has a good heart."

Working like a dog off the court, and staying calm on it, the 'Federer Express' quickly gathered momentum, and in February 2001, it went into overdrive. Claiming the first title of his career in Milan, Federer was named the ATP Player of the Month for February. He won 14 of 16 matches, and led Switzerland almost single-handedly to victory over the United States in the Davis Cup in Basel.

He even began to look different. A member of the ATP's New Balls Please marketing campaign and now a Davis Cup hero with an ATP title to his name, his wide eyed fascination with tour life had been replaced by the serenity of someone who looked utterly comfortable in his surroundings. He wore a pony-tail, a head scarf wrapped around his forehead during matches, and a look of newly-developed maturity.

Coming into Wimbledon, with a Roland Garros quarterfinal appearance under his belt, Federer was determined to show what he could do on grass. Despite winning the Boys singles three years earlier, he'd lost in the first round at the All England Club the two previous years and there were question marks over his ability to serve and volley on grass.

Against Yevgeny Kafelnikov the previous year, Federer had become so discouraged watching returns whistle past him in the opening game that he tried to play the Russian, one of the best baseliners in the world, from the back of the court. It didn't work, and was never likely to. On this surface he needed to fight his battles from the net, no matter what.

"The problem is that if you stay back on grass, it doesn't really matter how bad the other guy's return is, it's still tough to dig it out," acknowledged Federer. "So you serve and volley to make the other guy at least hit a good return."

That was the theory, but as Lundgren explained, it took a while for Federer to get to grips with forcibly charging the net on every ball.

"When he first started practising volleys he hated it, he wasn't good at it," said Lundgren. "It was like there were sharks inside the service box. But we practised, and now the sharks are gone."

Proving the point, Federer fought his way past Xavier Malisse in the second round, swept aside Jonas Bjorkman in the third, and then saw the name of Pete Sampras written next to his own in the draw.

Having looked up to the American for as long as he could remember, this was a dream come true for Federer.

It also marked the first time in his career that he would play on the Center Court at Wimbledon.

"For me it was a very strange feeling," he said. "Walking towards centre court - I'd never done it before - walking through the alleys just behind the scenes before anyone sees you. Before I walked on the court, the man who escorted me asked, 'so, do you know how it works on centre court?' I said that I didn't. Then he looked at Pete and said 'well, you probably know.' I had to laugh.

"He told me that I had to turn around at the service line and make my bow to the (Royal) Box. That is something special, something I probably always wanted to do once in my life and career."

The burning question that remained was how he would react to playing Sampras. He'd been compared to the great man for years, admired him for as long as he could remember, and here he was about to mix it with him on the biggest stage in the world. It was the ultimate test.

"Sometimes I looked across the net and saw him, someone so special and different," said Federer. "Normally you look on the other side and just see an opponent, but this time when I looked over, I saw Pete Sampras, my idol.

"I didn't feel normal. On my first service game my hands were ice cold, but I started off with an ace so that relieved me straightaway. I was thinking, 'Oh come on, that's a good start!' After the first two games we played, it was a normal match and I got into the groove."

So much so that after three and a half hours, they were still going at it. At 4-4 in the final set, with Federer serving, Sampras went in for the kill.

"I was really scared that my chance was slipping away," said Federer. "I could see on his face that he was raising his game."

But to the champion's amazement, Federer stood firm, held serve, and turned the tables, forcing two match points on the American's serve.

"I was very calm walking to the other side at 15-40," said Federer, re-living the moment. "Of course the crowd were going wild, but I was very focused on what I had to do. I took a chance, told myself that he would go to my forehand, and everything seemed to go so quickly. I hit it and I knew right then, 'that's it.'"

It was the most astonishing moment. As Sampras turned to watch the ball drop well inside his baseline, Federer fell to his knees, then collapsed onto his back as the weight of what he had done began to register.

"I went down on my knees and thought, 'Wow, this is better than anything I have ever experienced so I might as well just lie down! I had the feeling that I could have laid down there forever."

He didn't. He got up immediately and ran to the net where Sampras was waiting patiently. Federer knew what he had done. He'd inflicted the most painful injury possible on the champion by beating Sampras in a place that the American regarded as his own back yard. To celebrate while Sampras waited at the net would only add salt to the champion's wounds.

"I told myself to go and shake hands with Pete. I couldn't make him wait because he must have felt terrible and wanted to get out of there. I think it was a thing of respect," said Federer.

Packing his bags and heading for the exit, rapturous applause ringing in his ears, he walked obliviously past Sampras as the beaten champion stopped, bowed to the Royal Box, and trundled off again. Federer looked horrified. He turned red, quickly jumped back in line with Sampras, half-bowed, and shuffled off the court, grinning sheepishly. It was as if he'd forgotten to thank his best friend's mother for a lovely dinner, and suddenly rushed back to make his apologies.

"You know what happened?," protested Federer, pleading his innocence. "The guy who brought me on the court told me that the umpire is supposed to tell me what happens after the match, but how in the world could I hear what the umpire said when I shook hands with him? I don't even remember shaking hands with him! Everyone was making a big deal out of it, but I did the bow in the end."

In truth, no one made a big deal out of it. There was something rather endearing about watching this young boy performing miracles on court, and then innocently forgetting the formal bit at the end.

"It was typical me!” he confirmed. "I think everything went so quickly and if I had to think about the bow as well, it would have just been asking too much."

The world hailed a new star. The 'king was dead, long live the king', they said. But this wasn't to be Federer's Wimbledon crown, not yet. Despite a similarly brilliant and equally stubborn performance against Britain's Tim Henman in the quarterfinals, Federer ran out of steam.

At 20 though, life is good. He has endless skill, a genuinely nice nature and a wickedly good sense of humour (his latest practical joke involves the victim calling his mobile phone, hearing Federer answer 'hello?', but then feeling stupid when the voice adds 'ha, got you again, leave a message'). In short, he has the potential to become one of the biggest names in the game.

Fellow New Balls Andy Roddick, Marat Safin and Juan Carlos Ferrrero will make waves of their own in the future, but it's the potential rivalry between Federer and Hewitt which really get pulses racing. They couldn't be more different. Federer's game and personality are loose, relaxed and easy on the eye while Hewitt is intensity personified.

The match they played in the Basel semifinals in 2000 was enough to make the mouth water. Both players ran side to side, hit the cover off the ball and dripped emotion throughout, and after saving a match point it was Federer who came through.

There was something familiar about watching Federer purr to the net and Hewitt counterattack from the baseline. It was like Sampras against Agassi all over again.

"I like to play Hewitt," says Federer. "I'm not surprised that he won the US Open because his game is so solid, his feet always move and his legs are always there. For me it's different. I have to tell myself to move. I hope that in the future my condition will be so good that I never lose matches because of my body again. If I can do that, I think I will be very dangerous, more dangerous even than him. When you play Hewitt, you know what's coming. When you play me, you don't know what's going to come."

One thing's for sure, if they both turn it on at the same time, tennis fans are in for a treat.

As Eurosport commentator Simon Reed put it, when he watched the Swiss beat the Australian that day in Basel.

"I've just seen the future of tennis, and it looks alright to me."