If Roger Federer is seen by many as a secular saint, then his recent resurgence feels like a miracle. He is a 35-year-old male, playing the world’s most universal individual sport, and redefining it. The whole phenomenon is so improbable that it is unlikely to be repeated.

But why is Federer such an outlier? Perhaps because he represents the Platonic ideal of a tennis player. In other words, if you set out to build the perfect winning machine, you would come up with a 6ft 2in optimist with a single-handed backhand and a taste for bold experimentation.