“Youngsters play good on the day. It’s if they can play good for the week, that’s the question.”

“All he did was keep the ball in play, moving me around.”

“He’s stayed pretty much the same, over the last, say, nine months or so. He really hasn’t changed.”

All are quotes from Roger Federer immediately after losses in the past 20 months. The first was to Andy Murray in Cincinnati in 2006, then to Guillermo Cañas, of Argentina, at the Pacific Life Open in Indian Wells, California, a year ago, and finally to Novak Djokovic, the Serb, at the Australian Open in January. The comments go to the core of the world No 1. He neither cares for losing nor relishes its bitter aftertaste.

British tennis messageboards were split evenly between rah-rah-rahs for Murray’s victory in the first round of the Barclays Dubai Championships on Monday and intolerance of the comments by the Swiss. The sense is that Federer has lost a lot of popular approval for his less than gracious reaction to a second defeat in three matches by the British No 1.

Generally, Federer’s arrival in an interview room after he has lost barely affords enough time for a towelling down. When he wins, he takes his time and is then generous with it in four languages. When he said of Murray after his 6-7, 6-3, 6-4 defeat that “he’s going to have to grind very hard for the next few years if he keeps playing this way”, it was a statement of the obvious, except that it was delivered in the manner of a sniffy rebuke.

The odd sly dig at an opponent helps to dodge criticism of one’s own performance. But there is much for the 26-year-old to ponder after back-to-back competitive defeats. Federer regards the period after the Australian Open as crucial to prepare mind and body for the next rump of events. Last year, he spent the time with Tony

Roche, the veteran Australian coach, although their relationship was cooling to the extent that it had broken down three months later.

Between his losses to Djokovic in Melbourne and Murray in Dubai, Federer went 39 days without playing a match. In that time no one has told him when he should practise or what he should practise. That is tough, whatever your talent and powers of self-motivation. And so we reached the first round of a championship stacked with top players with Federer more vulnerable than most. It showed.

The year began with folk counting down to a fourteenth grand-slam tournament title to equal Pete Sampras’s record. Now they wonder when he will next shake hands with a loser.

Federer heads to the Masters Series event in Indian Wells starting next week, where he was beaten in his opening match in 2007 by Cañas, and Djokovic said yesterday that players are sensing the Swiss’s vulnerability. “When the time is passing you learn more, especially if you play him, so after those results in the last couple of months more players are believing they can win against him,” the Serb, who expected Murray to win, said.

The Scot, meanwhile, can get on with the tournament and focus on today’s match against Fernando Verdasco, of Spain, without worrying about Federer or whatever he said about him. Murray looks as good as he ever has and is back under the No 1’s skin. It is a very good place to be.

Hingis back on court

Martina Hingis may have finished her competitive tennis career in November in disgrace, having tested positive for cocaine at last year’s Wimbledon and subsequently been handed a two-year ban, but she will be back on grass in June, at the Liverpool International at Calderstones Park. The former world No 1 and five-times grand-slam event winner can play because it is an invitational event and not part of the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, but the decision to invite the Swiss may induce a level of scorn that the tournament, seeking to establish itself as an integral part of the Wimbledon build-up, could do without.