Federer finally on Twitter

Paris - Roger Federer's perfect sense of timing on court has brought him a record 17 Grand Slam titles, but he admitted on Friday he's been a little slow to appreciate the advantages of Twitter.

Federer, who can boast more than 12 million likes on his Facebook page, finally signed up for the social media site late on Thursday and had over 173 000 followers by Friday afternoon.

He still has a long way to go to catch French Open champion and world No 4 Rafael Nadal, who has more than four million following him on Twitter.

"For me, it's really connecting with the fans on a different platform than what I've done in the past. I also clearly wanted to see for myself how does it really work for the other players and other athletes and other people around the world, you know."

Federer, 31, admits he was rather reluctant to get involved with Twitter at the start.

"I wasn't sure in the beginning, to be honest," he said. "For me to enter that right away was not the right thing to do. I wanted to first wait and see and only do it when I felt very comfortable and not get pushed into it by someone.

"It's got to be something I needed to feel comfortable with, and I did get many comments from many fans and followers that they would love to see me on Twitter. I said, 'Okay, I'm happy to give it a try and have some fun with it.'"

The Swiss launched his Twitter account - @RogerFederer - by posting a photo of himself accompanied by the message:"(sic)A little (blue) bird told me that the place to be is @twitter, so here I am! pic.twitter.com/8AQzBsC6ia"