ROGER FEDERER augmented one of the most coveted records in tennis on January 28th when he won the men’s singles title at the Australian Open. It was his 20th victory at one of the sport’s four “grand-slam” events (the others are the French Open, Wimbledon and the US Open). It put him four titles ahead of his nearest challenger, Rafael Nadal.

Mr Federer’s triumph also marked a less celebrated milestone. It represented the 13th consecutive men’s grand-slam tournament without a first-time winner. The previous longest streak of 12 such results, which ran from 1908 to 1911, was broken that year by André Gobert, who won the French Open. Marin Cilic, Mr Federer’s opponent in Sunday’s thrilling five-set final, is the most recent man to have claimed a maiden grand-slam title, by winning the US Open in 2014.

Mr Cilic, now aged 29, is also the youngest champion currently on the men’s tour, since none of the players born in the 1990s has yet won a major title. The youngsters will have to wait at least another four months to break through—and probably longer, since the 31-year-old Mr Nadal is the odds-on favourite to clinch his 11th title at the French Open in June.

Though a long dry spell for such a large cohort of players might seem unusual, the twenty-somethings of today are not the only group to have struggled for silverware. Just one grand-slam winner, Chuck McKinley, was born during a five-year period between 1938 and 1943. Mats Wilander was the only champion from an equivalent cohort between 1960 and 1965.

The other scrap of comfort for the cup-less kids is that, like Messrs Federer and Nadal, they will probably enjoy extended careers. The average age of male tennis players has fluctuated over the decades. It dropped when new players appeared after the second world war, and spiked at the beginning of the Open era in 1968, when professionals were allowed to compete in the four major tournaments. That rule change brought back older stars like Rod Laver and Ken Rosewall, who had given up their amateur status in the early 1960s. The current ageing trend may owe much to improvements in sports medicine, which have allowed many stars to compete at their peak for longer. In 1990 the average age of a male player who competed in a grand slam was 24. By 2017 it had risen to 28. A similar trend is apparent among female players, too.

Better medical support might also have helped tall and hefty men to survive the attrition of lengthy careers. Today the average male grand-slam player stands at 187cm (6 feet 1 inch) and weighs 80kg (176lbs), making him about 5cm taller and 3kg heavier than his equivalent at the start of the Open era. The potential champions born in the 1990s are particularly lanky. Three of the best—Milos Raonic, Nick Kyrgios and Alexander Zverev—loom at 193cm or above. Only one man of such height, Marat Safin, has ever reached the top of the world rankings, doing so briefly for three spells between 2000 and 2001.

Young players struggle to assert themselves against the “big four” of tennis—not just Mr Federer and Mr Nadal but also Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray (both 30 years old). But the quartet will some day have to hang up their racquets. When they do, there will probably be lots of new champions, if the women’s game is anything to judge by. Despite Serena Williams’ dominance, six of the last 12 female winners have been first-timers. The men from the 1990s might have to bide their time, but it will come.