Federer and Woods ride the hype to stunning wins and reinforce their status as 'Great' sportsmen

But after the events of last weekend, when Roger Federer stormed his way to success in the Australian Tennis Open and Tiger Woods came from behind to win the Buick Invitational in San Diego, few would cavil if these sportsmen are granted the mantle of greatness.

Federer wins with grace and style

Throughout his career Roger Federer has not just won an astonishing percentage of the tournaments that he has played in but always done so with style. He is not a flamboyant player and there are never the tantrums that we have seen with others on the circuit, but that does not mean that Federer is dull or a ruthless machine. Far from it. He literally plays shots that no one else has ever played drawing gasps from even the most knowledgeable of tennis spectators. But whilst Federer's technical excellence and creativity are supreme it is his temperament that is probably his most valuable asset. In the final in Melbourne against the brilliant Fernando González he was being outplayed for a time in the first set and had to save two set points. It seemed to me that at that moment Federer had the capability only to look forward and not think even for a split second about how he had got into trouble. It is easy for a coach to say 'Forget the last point it is only the next one that matters' but with Federer we have a player who does that instinctively. How often have we seen other fine tennis players collapse because of a bad line call or a botched shot? Federer has never done this - he is always positive even when he has those rare moments when he struggles.

French Open is Federer's goal - and this year he should achieve it

It's a mug's game making sporting predictions and I don't usually do it - but I'm prepared to make an exception and say that I expect Roger Federer to complete his set of Grand Slam titles by winning the French Open this year. The French is a strange tournament and has been won by some curious victors over the years - Gaston Gaudio, Juan Carlos Ferraro, Sergi Bruguera and their like are not exactly household names. As well as Federer other multiple Grand Slam winners like John McEnroe, Pete Sampras, Boris Becker and Jimmy Connors never fully mastered the French Open's clay courts sufficiently to win. Federer came close in 2006 and he will be pretty determined to go one better this year - don't bet against it.

Woods at the peak of his powers

Whilst Roger Federer has reached close to the very apogee of tennis excellence at the age of 25 it has taken Tiger Woods a little longer to become almost unbeatable. True he has been a great player from the moment he became a professional in 1996 but the mature 31 year old Woods is putting together a run of success which is unequalled in the modern game. With his victory in the Buick Woods has now won seven of the last ten tournaments in which he has competed - an astonishing record. For those readers who get their golf information courtesy of the United Sates media you will perhaps think that the Tiger has won his last seven successive tournaments - a so-called 'winning streak'. The insular American media seem not to recognise golf tournaments outside of the United States so they have conveniently ignored the fact that Woods played in three tournaments which he did not win during his run of PGA Tour success. The PGA tour and American golf spectators struggle to acknowledge any events that don't feature on the PGA lists and see Woods participation in this week's Desert Classic as being a diversion, a chance for him to tune his game. American Golf writer Ron Sirak showed the insularity of the sport in the US when he wrote '[Tiger] will get some more time to work on his game because his appearance next week in the Dubai Desert Classic won't count in terms of the record'. Well that isn't how Tiger sees it - he knows that the Classic is a true test of golf and one of the best events anywhere in the game. He wants to win it.

The truly great champions set the standard

So the world of sport has in Roger Federer and Tiger Woods two great champions who have, with their achievements, rewritten the record books and set the very highest standards. When they eventually retire from their sports they will join, in modern times, very few other true greats - Michael Schumacher in Formula one and Lance Armstrong in cycling, but there aren't many more. So the next time you here a good player in any post described as 'great' ponder a moment if they are of the Federer or Woods level of performance and, if not, downgrade them to 'very good'!